by Chris Taylor
“Hi, Mom, how are you?”
“Lane, I’m fine. More importantly, how are you? I just saw the late news. I recognized you and your men from the footage. I’m so glad everything turned out all right.”
“Thanks, Mom. So am I. We were lucky.”
“It was more than luck, Lane. You’re a fine detective.”
He instinctively ducked his head. “Thanks,” he mumbled.
“I’m so proud of you, Lane. That little girl and her family don’t know how lucky they were to have you on their case.”
“Mom…” he protested. “It wasn’t just me. We all helped out.”
“I’m sure everyone did their bit, but some people go above and beyond. That’s just the way it is.” She paused and her voice roughened with emotion. “Your father was like that, and so are you.”
A lump formed in Lane’s throat. He tried to say something, but found he couldn’t. He swallowed and tried again.
“Mom, you don’t have to say that.”
“I’m not just saying it, Lane. I mean it. Your father was a man of honor and integrity, a man of determination and courage. He always gave everything he had, every single time. It didn’t matter who needed help. He gave it freely, without complaint and came home after every shift a contented man.”
“Until he didn’t.”
His bald statement was met with silence. Guilt surged through him and then he immediately felt angry for feeling guilty.
It was the truth, wasn’t it? His increasingly heated thoughts were interrupted by his mother’s resigned acceptance.
“You’re right, Lane. You’re absolutely right. One night, he didn’t come home. I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“Why weren’t you mad? I never saw you yell or shout or cry at the injustice of it. I never saw you throw plates or slam doors or…or hit something. How come, Mom? How come you never got mad?”
“Who says I didn’t? You were only a child, Lane. You couldn’t have possibly understood everything you saw or didn’t see. There were plenty of times when I ranted and cried and yes, I even threw a few plates, but I made sure I did it when you and your brothers were out—either at school, or at the park. There were a handful of times I even did when you were asleep.
“There was a long, long time when I was mad at everyone—and particularly your father. What had he been thinking? How could he have left us all alone, to fend for ourselves when we needed him so badly?”
Her voice cracked. She dragged in a deep, shuddering breath. He wanted to tell her to stop. He wanted to offer her comfort. But he couldn’t. For far too long, he’d wanted to ask the questions that had circled in his head for so many years.
Respect and love for his mother, and fear of the answers, had held him back but he couldn’t hold back any longer. He had to know. He needed to know. For his sake, and for Zara’s.
“Would you have done things differently if you’d known?” he asked.
“No.” Her answer was swift and decisive.
“How can you say that?”
She sighed heavily. “Your father and I loved each other more than we thought possible. We met when we were just out of high school. Within months, we were married. Of course, there were plenty who criticized us, told us we’d never last, but we ignored them all and got on with our lives.
“I went to secretarial school and your father entered the Police Academy. It was hard, but we managed and we had each other, and a few years later, you, the first of our boys arrived. We had no need for anything, but each other. Our family was all that mattered.” She gave a sad, little laugh. “It sounds like something out of a sappy old movie, but it’s the truth. We were happiest when we were together.”
“It must have made it that much harder to go on without him.”
“Absolutely. There was a long period when I didn’t think I’d survive on my own. My heart had shriveled and died and was buried in the ground right alongside him. If it hadn’t been for you boys, I don’t know what I would have done. I knew I had to live for you. And so, I did.”
“It makes us sound like such a burden,” Lane said.
“Never! Lane Francis Black! Don’t you ever say a thing like that! I loved your father more than life itself, but I loved my children, too. Even in the depths of my grief and despair, during the darkest time of my life, I never once wanted to leave my boys or relinquish any burden. Our family was worth my all.”
Tears pricked Lane’s eyes. He drew in a deep breath and bit his lip against the surge of emotion that tightened his chest.
“Do you believe me, Lane?” Her question was pitched low. He strained to hear it. A sob escaped his tightly compressed mouth and he bit his lips harder.
“Do you?” This time, her voice was louder and tinged with panic.
He nodded and then verbalized his response. “Yes, Mom, I believe you.”
She breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you. I’m so glad. You don’t know how much that means to me. I-I’ve never talked to your brothers about this. Perhaps, I should.”
“Perhaps,” Lane agreed, “but I think you should wait until they ask. It might not be the right time for them.”
“Why now, Lane? Why are you asking, after all these years? Is it the right time for you?”
Images of Zara crowded Lane’s mind and the tightness in his chest eased. Love and tenderness filled his heart. All of a sudden, he knew he’d found the woman he’d love until the day that he died. Whenever that would be.
“I’ve met a girl.”
“Oh, Lane! I’m so pleased. I’d almost given up on you finding someone to settle down with. I take it that things are serious?”
Lane filled his lungs to capacity and then blew it out. “Yes. I think I’m in love with her.”
“And does she love you?”
“I’m not sure, but she definitely cares.”
“I’m so happy for you. I had begun to wonder if your father’s death had affected the way you felt about a family. You’re thirty-one and so far, I’ve never seen you date a girl longer than a week or two. I was hoping it had nothing to do with how things turned out for me.”
Lane shouldn’t have been surprised by his mother’s perceptiveness. As a kid, he’d never been able to keep anything from her.
“I can’t tell you that hasn’t been a part of it,” he admitted quietly. “In fact, up until now, I honestly didn’t think I could handle the risk of dying young and leaving a family behind to struggle onward without me. But after talking to you, I think my outlook has changed. For the first time, I can see it from your point of view. That the short years you and Dad had together brought you more happiness than a lot of people have over a lifetime and that’s something to be cherished and celebrated and remembered.”
“Lane, you’re a police officer like your dad and there’s always a chance you won’t come home. We both know that. But you have to remember the thousands of officers who go to work every day and do come home. Focus on them, the ones who make it, not on the handful who don’t.”
“I want to.” His voice was a husky whisper. He cleared his throat and tried again. “You don’t know how much I want to.”
“There isn’t a day goes by that I don’t wish your father was still here beside me, but I never regret a single moment of our time together.” She paused for a moment and then said, “Do you remember how much I like Fleetwood Mac?”
Lane frowned and tried to keep up with his mother’s sudden shift of topic.
“Yeah, I guess so. You used to play their CDs until we were ready to leave home.”
His mother chuckled in memory. “I did, didn’t I? Anyway, what I wanted to tell you was, Stevie Nicks sang a song called Love’s a Hard Game to Play. Do you know the one I’m talking about?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“It’s a great song and I played it a lot during the years after your father died. There are a couple of lines toward the end of that song that helped me through the darkest times.”
“It goes like this: ‘Just when I feel like I’m losin’ you, I hear them voices call. They say it’s better to have lost at love than never to have loved at all.’”
His mother’s sweet voice sounded softly in his ear. Emotion surged through him. Tears spilled over and ran down his cheeks.
“That’s how I feel about your dad,” she whispered, her voice choked with tears. “That’s exactly how I feel.”
“I love you, Mom.”
“I love you too, Lane, and I hope this girl comes to love you as much as you deserve.” She paused and then her voice lowered on a ragged sigh. “If she loves you even half as much as I loved your father, it will be enough.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Tuesday, January 30, 8:42 p.m.
After what seemed an interminable amount of time being jostled, bound and gagged, on the back seat of the kidnapper’s car, the vehicle turned into what looked like an industrial area. From Zara’s prone position and through her uninjured eye, she caught glimpses of large sheds lit with security lights. The headlights picked up the shape of a low building hunched away from the others behind a high wire fence. The driver headed the car toward it.
Their approach was met by the sound of a pack of barking dogs. Although she couldn’t make them out in the darkness, it seemed like they were right outside her door. Minutes later, the man brought the car to a stop and hauled her out. Her cheek burned from where he’d struck it with his fist. One eye was swollen shut. Her legs wobbled at the unaccustomed rough handling and she struggled to gain her balance. Her captor spun her around. It was then that she saw it.
Emblazoned across both of the double entry doors was a logo of an enormous Redback spider. Zara’s heart jumped into her throat and all of a sudden, she knew why her captor had seemed familiar: She’d been kidnapped by none other than Draco Jovanovic.
Yelling at the dogs and with his hand tight around her elbow, Draco dragged her across the parking lot and through the doorway of what she presumed was their clubhouse. Despite its rundown exterior, inside, the walls were lined with newly painted plasterboard. A handful of expensive leather couches were scattered haphazardly throughout the large open space. Men in jeans and black leather jackets lounged around, talking with glasses of alcohol in their hands. Only one or two of them looked in her direction and then indifferently turned away.
A well-stocked bar, hewn from enormous planks of pine took up most of one corner of the room. Its smoothly polished surface sparkled from numerous down lights positioned strategically in the ceiling. Light also glinted off row after row of glittering glassware housed in brass racks above the barman’s head.
The barman himself looked like a carbon copy of Draco—an over-large package of beef and brawn who emanated an underlying air of menace. Biceps as big as grapefruit were paired with a massive chest, closely set eyes and a shaved head that glistened in the light.
The barman’s snowy white shirt looked crisp and freshly ironed and had been decorated with an expertly knotted black bow tie. He stared at her with baleful eyes, not a hint of curiosity lighting their dark depths, even after they rested briefly on her bruised and battered face and the bindings around her wrists.
The thought of begging the man for help took hold in Zara’s mind. She opened her mouth to speak. Draco’s grip tightened painfully on her arm. He leaned in close, his breath warm and fetid against her face.
“One word and I’ll put a bullet in your head.” He opened his jacket and she caught a glimpse of the gun as light glinted off its barrel. Renewed fear took a stronghold over her body and mind.
“Besides,” he continued, his gaze menacing, “Who do you think will come to your rescue? Everyone in here is a member of the Redbacks. And I’m their president.”
Zara’s mouth closed with a discernible click. Dread cemented in her stomach. Through the dimness, she spied a larger group of biker members lounging across the other side of the room, drinks, cigarettes—or both—in their hands. Unlike the group she’d seen on her way in, one of these men gave her a thorough once-over before catching her eye and winking at her. His suggestive leer sent shivers of unease down her spine. And then he spoke.
“Hey, Prez, the pigs were here lookin’ for you earlier.” The man sauntered over to where she and Draco were standing. Zara froze.
“Oh, yeah? What time did they get here?” Draco asked, his casual tone belying the tension around his jaw.
“Bit after one. They were all fired up, ready for action. You should have seen their disappointment when I told them you weren’t here.” The man laughed, displaying a mouthful of tobacco-stained teeth. Zara tried not to breathe in the rank stench from his body.
“Good job I was otherwise occupied,” Draco replied. “What were they after, Toothpick?”
The man called Toothpick smiled slyly. “Said they were lookin’ for you. Said they were bringin’ you in.”
Draco’s gaze narrowed. “What did you tell them?”
“I didn’t tell them nothin’.” He hawked up a globule of phlegm and spat it inches away from Zara’s feet. “They’re fuckin’ pigs. What do you think I said?”
Draco shook his head in disgust. “You’re a filthy prick, Toothpick. Go and clean that shit up. And you’re lucky you kept your mouth shut. I don’t need any more trouble from the cops. I’ve still got business to do.”
Draco turned away from Toothpick. With a none-too-gentle shove, he pushed her in the direction of a closed door. Within moments, he’d unlocked it and deposited her inside what she presumed was his office. With eyes narrowed in silent warning, he turned and left, pulling the door closed behind him. She didn’t fail to hear the decisive click of the lock on his departure.
As soon as she was alone, Zara strained against the bindings that held her wrists tight and prayed that by some miracle, they’d loosened since she’d last checked. Gritting her teeth, she ignored the pain in her face and focused all of her attention on wriggling her fingers to loosen her bonds. Her numb hands made her efforts even more difficult. She held her breath and gave it another go.
The bindings didn’t budge. Not even an inch. The only thing she felt was a shaft of pain shoot up her arms. She stifled a sob and searched for inner strength. Now wasn’t the time to cry.
In order to distract herself, she tried to concentrate on the possible reasons why she’d been kidnapped. The Redbacks’ attempt to take Brittany had failed. Why would they risk another? The police were already on their tail. It wouldn’t take a genius to work out who had taken her when Lane and her family discovered she was missing.
She groaned in anguish at the thought of Lane. After the way they’d parted, she was sure he wouldn’t be looking for her any time soon. She only hoped her father, or even perhaps Allison, would notice her absence and wonder enough about it to raise the alarm.
But what if they didn’t? What if no one found her hastily scrawled note? Or worse, what if they found her note, but decided she must still be with Lane? Would they even think to call him and check?
Probably not. Even though she could count on one hand the number of times she’d spent the night at a friend’s house, she was an adult, free to come and go as she chose. It could be some time tomorrow, when she failed to show for work, before anyone became concerned enough to question her whereabouts.
Panic clenched at her belly and tightened her already-ragged nerves. She fought hard against it. Drawing in a breath, she eased the air out between dry lips and did her best to keep the fear at bay.
She looked around her to distract herself from her discouraging thoughts. The room where she’d been unceremoniously tossed was generously furnished with an expensive-looking leather couch decorated with cushions in hues of red and cream. An enormous flat screen TV was mounted on the opposite wall. An imposing, red cedar desk stood parallel to the back wall and took up almost a third of the space in the smallish room.
While her hands were still bound,
her feet were not and she was free to explore her surroundings in what dim light was provided by the small antique lamp on the desk. Thinking quickly, she scoured the room for possible escape routes.
There were no windows and the only door she could see was the one Draco had locked behind him. Despair and rising panic hovered at the edge of her consciousness and she groaned aloud at the helplessness of her situation. The low ache in her belly reminded her it had been a long time since she’d used the bathroom.
Not that she was eager to re-enter the main part of the clubhouse. Memories of the undisguised desire on the face of the man who’d eyed her earlier sent any thoughts of requesting the use of a nearby bathroom, scattering like dandelions tossed to the breeze.
Taking a seat on the couch, she crossed her legs and tried to direct her thoughts elsewhere. The memory of Lane’s tortured expression as she walked out of his house flooded her mind. She groaned again, almost preferring the uncomfortableness of her full bladder to recalling the way they’d parted.
After their wondrous time earlier, she’d felt like the luckiest girl in the world. At last, she’d found a man who called to her on every level, who was smart, funny, charming and so damned sexy he took her breath away. At the time, she’d been floating on a bubble of happiness, so light and so giddy she could scarcely keep her feet on the ground.
But then he’d blown it. He’d turned his back on any chance they might have of making something together and she watched and listened as his fear dictated his life. With that, the glorious possibility of building a life with him had been ripped away, leaving her bereft and empty.
It wasn’t that she didn’t understand his fear. After hearing about the death of his father, she could appreciate how it might affect him and the decisions he made, particularly given that Lane was also a police officer. But everyone faced certain fears in their life and it wasn’t healthy to let those fears define who they became. It was just like she’d told him: Bad things happen. But good things happen, too, if you’re brave enough to recognize opportunities and reach for them.