by Dale Mayer
She edged closer to Greyson, whispering now. “It’s the kind of thing that you don’t really understand about a person until you live with them for a while,” she said. “At that point, the façade, the shininess starts to fade, and the real person shows up. But you still don’t really understand until something happens—like, in my case, the pregnancy—and you see just what an asshole he is.”
“He wanted an abortion?” Greyson was whispering now too.
She nodded. “He didn’t want a family, didn’t want the expense of a family, and definitely didn’t want to pay child support.”
“So it doesn’t make any sense that he’s involved in kidnapping Danny now,” he said.
“I know. I keep racking my brain about that. And why didn’t he just get the lawyers in on it? His request started with the lawyers.”
“Lawyers cost money.”
“George had money,” she said, “but maybe he had a midlife crisis and needed to produce a child to continue his lineage or some such nonsense,” she said with a shrug. She shook her head. “It was basically both of us at the same time having our own crises. He was moving out, and I couldn’t afford to keep the place and wanted to get a long way away from him anyway, so a friend of mine moved us here.”
“Would that friend have anything to do with this?”
She laughed. “No, not at all. That’s the definition of a friend. Somebody who helps, not somebody who turns around and tries to steal your child.”
“I get that,” he said, “but all kinds of reasons are in the back of people’s minds for doing stuff.”
“I don’t think I like the way your mind works,” she said with a sad look at him. “I think you’ve lived in the war zone too much so you see something wrong in everybody now.”
“Probably,” he said, “but it’s also the truth.”
She looked at him and asked, “You need something to eat?”
He hesitated and then said, “Do you have anything?”
“There’s always food of some kind,” she said with a smile. She got up, opened the fridge, and said, “Are you up for bacon and eggs?”
“I’m always up for bacon and eggs,” he said. “It certainly doesn’t have to be a morning meal either,” he said with a laugh. “Some foods are good all day long.”
“I got you covered then,” she said.
Now that the adrenaline had worn off, and he’d been in the unfortunate position of having to tell her that they had lost the kidnapper, Greyson now sat hugging a cup of coffee and watching as Jessica whipped up bacon and eggs. It was a joy to see her in the kitchen. She was obviously comfortable and happy to be here. He enjoyed being in the kitchen himself, but he preferred being around a barbecue grill more.
When she turned around with two full plates, he smiled. “Now that looks perfect,” he said. “Thank you so much.”
She shook her head. “No way I can thank you for what you did,” she said. The two of them sat at the island and watched as Danny now played beside them. He was a little on the cranky side, soon getting up to lay on the couch, but he fidgeted still. She saw it, looked at Greyson, and said, “I know he’s not feeling well. Maybe I’ll take him up for a nap after we’re done eating.”
“You do that,” he said, “and I’ll crash on the couch.”
She looked at him in surprise.
He shook his head. “If you think you’ll be alone while this guy on the loose, think again.”
She continued to stare at him, her eyes darkening.
“I’m no threat to you,” he said gently. “I promise.”
She gave a quick headshake. “I know that,” she said. “I hadn’t really given too much thought to what would happen after this,” she said. “The cops weren’t too interested in a protection detail. And, of course, it’s not that big of a deal to them.”
“It is, but they have a shortage of man-hours, and there’s a cost involved,” he said.
She nodded reluctantly. “That always ends up being the bottom line, doesn’t it?” She sank back on her chair, studying her son morosely. “I’ll have to move.”
“Do you have some place to move to?”
She shook her head. “No, not really,” she said. “I’ve still got vacation time this week and next, but then I have to go back to work too.”
He watched while she pushed the tendrils of hair off her face.
“Well, for the moment,” he said, “I’ll move into your downstairs and make sure nobody else tries to come into the house and take Danny again.”
“And that’s a temporary solution,” she muttered. “I need a long-term solution.”
“The only long-term solution,” he said, “is getting rid of this guy and finding out who hired him. If somebody was hired on, that is.”
She shot him a hard look. “Do you really think it could be anybody other than George?”
“What kind of event would cause him to do something like this, after all this time?” He looked over at Danny. “Why after two years would he come out of the blue and try to take him?”
Her shoulders sagged. “That’s the same question I’ve been asking myself since that fender bender,” she muttered.
“Exactly,” he said, “so we won’t rule it out, but we also have to focus on something other than just that, so we don’t make a mistake. I don’t want to be narrow-minded and get locked into one idea.’
“That’s fine,” she said, hopping to her feet. Grabbing their dirty dishes, she took them over to the sink and washed them. “And I appreciate you staying around to keep us safe,” she said, “but this is hardly what you’re supposed to be spending your time on.” And then she remembered the dog. “Oh, my God, what about the dog?”
“She’s in the backyard,” he said.
“But you said she can easily go over the fence.”
“I left her tied up for the moment,” he said. “I could hardly just bring her into your house without making sure it was okay with you.”
She shook her head. “Of course it’s okay with me. That dog saved Danny’s life. Twice.” She walked to the rear door, turned to look at him, and asked, “Do you think it’s safe?”
“I believe it’s very safe,” he said beside her, stepping out on the veranda. There on the corner, stretched out on her side, was Kona, the rope just letting her reach the veranda. He walked over, untied the end of the rope, and walked her inside the house. Stretching in front of the couch, Kona gave Danny a good sniffing over, then laid down on the floor right in front of him.
Danny had immediately slid off the couch and sat right up against the dog’s belly, then stretched out, with his chest over the dog’s chest. Kona just lapped up the attention from the little boy. She didn’t make any move to dislodge the boy. Not a twitch.
“We need to get her a collar and a lead,” he said. “This rope isn’t the best system.”
“Maybe not,” she said, “but it worked okay in the short-term.”
“It did, indeed.”
She motioned at it. “Do we leave it on?”
He hesitated, then nodded. “For the moment, yes.”
She frowned. “How will you go out and get a leash if she’s here with me? I’m not sure I’m capable of controlling her,” she said cautiously.
“I don’t think anybody needs to control her,” he said, “because she’s obviously pretty attached to your son.”
As they watched, Danny’s hand, which had been scratching Kona, slowed and eventually just stopped.
Jessica said, “Do you think he’s asleep?”
“Looks like it to me,” he said, “and that might solve your problem, since you said he wasn’t settling in so well.”
“Well, I knew he was tired, but this, this is too cute.” She shook her head, and Greyson smiled.
Then he got up with his phone, took a picture of it, and sent it to Badger. His response came back immediately.
Well, there’s the bond you mentioned.
Yes, but not necessarily the bond tha
t will look after Kona, he responded. Then he looked at her and said, “I’ll crash here on the couch. Why don’t you take him up to his bed? He’ll sleep better.”
She nodded slowly and said, “Do you think the dog will be upset?”
“No,” he said, “Kona knows.” And he bent down, gently slid an arm underneath the little boy’s chest and legs, then passed him over carefully to Jessica.
She put him up against her shoulder and walked to the stairs. She stopped at the bottom, turned to looked at him and said, “Are you sure you are okay there?” she asked. “There’s not even a pillow or blanket.”
He pointed to a throw and said, “That’s there if I need it, so I’ll be fine,” he said. “I just want to have a short nap so I can recoup some of my lost energy.”
“All right then,” she said. “We’ll go have a nap and come down in a little bit.” He watched as she headed up the stairs, then he crashed on his back, his feet up on the armrest and his head on a throw pillow, then pulled out his phone. She’s gone to have a nap, and I’m standing guard. We need to find this guy before he comes back again.
Chapter 10
Upstairs, Jessica still couldn’t leave her son alone, so she tucked him into her bed and stretched out beside him. He never even woke after collapsing on top of the dog. That’s what she needed—a dog that could go from being half-wild when attacking somebody to being absolutely comfortable, even wanting close contact with a toddler like that.
But her thoughts couldn’t keep going around in circles because she was too damn tired. With an arm wrapped around her son, she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.
She woke after just a few minutes with that same sense of shock and realization, only to realize that Danny was still right beside her. She snuggled back on the bed, cuddling him a little closer, knowing that this would be something she had to live with for the rest of her life. She owed Greyson so much for recovering her son, but she didn’t have any idea how to thank him.
There he was, lying on the couch downstairs to make sure that nobody came in so they could sleep. And that’s when she realized that he probably wouldn’t sleep at all. As long as she was sleeping, he wouldn’t relax.
She shook her head at that. How completely different men could be. No way her ex-husband would have ever done that. He would have said he would stay awake, but he wouldn’t have. He would have just waited for her to crash, and then he would have crashed too. But somehow she didn’t think Greyson operated like that.
As she lay here, she thought she heard somebody coming up the stairs. She stiffened, her gaze on the doorway. And there was Kona, dragging her rope behind her, coming upstairs. The dog went into Danny’s room first, not finding him there, so Kona came into Jessica’s bedroom. Kona stopped at the doorway, raised her head, and sniffed. Then, as if sensing that both of them were here, she laid down in the open doorway.
On her heels was Greyson. He looked over at Jessica and smiled.
She whispered, “Was she checking on Danny?”
Greyson nodded and whispered back, “Looks like it.”
Kona gave a happy sigh, her tail thumping on the floor.
“She really is looking out for him, isn’t he?”
“I think so, yes,” he said. “So how come you’re not asleep?”
“I was,” she said quietly. “Then I woke up, scared that he was gone.”
Greyson nodded sympathetically. “I hear you, and that might happen for a while,” he said, “but you need to rest.”
“So do you,” she shot back. And then she couldn’t sleep anymore. She yawned, and, sitting up, she swung her legs over the edge of the bed. “I guess that was my ten-minute power nap.”
“It was actually about forty minutes,” he said, chuckling.
She looked at him, surprised, then over at the clock on her night table. “Wow. I had no idea.”
“Exactly,” he said. “So it’s all good.”
She nodded at Danny and then said, “I want him to get more sleep, but I don’t want to leave him up here alone.”
“What if we leave Kona up here?” he said with a motion toward the dog, who had now sneaked a little farther into the room, and lay at the foot of the bed.
Jessica smiled, then walked over and bent down with her hand out. Kona sniffed, then nuzzled her hand. Enchanted, she scratched her gently. “She really is beautiful, isn’t she?”
“Yes,” he said, “she really is. Inside and out. And extremely well-behaved.”
“Dang it, I still didn’t think about food for her,” she said.
He hesitated and said, “I need to go out and get dog food, plus a collar and a lead for her, and I could pick up some groceries for us too.”
“Or,” she said, “we could wait until Danny wakes up, and we could all go.”
He studied her face for a long moment and then smiled. “We can do that too.”
She beamed up at him. “Thank you. I just—” And her voice fell away.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said, reaching out. Just then his phone rang. He looked at it and said, “I’ve got to take this. Do you mind if I put the teakettle on?”
“Of course not,” she said. “Make yourself at home.”
He lifted a hand and went downstairs.
She crawled back up on the bed, grabbing her laptop from the bedside table, and checking her emails. She didn’t want to leave her son and, at the same time, felt oddly comfortable having Kona at the end of the bed. The dog was completely calm, relaxed, and sleeping.
Having Greyson downstairs was the icing on the cake. She could hear him talking but didn’t have a clue what was going on. She just hoped it was progress on the hunt for the asshole who had kidnapped her son. Of all the things she could let go of, the one thing that was not acceptable was hurting her child. Particularly taking him the way he’d been snatched.
“Right. Okay. I got it, Stone. He’s in the wind. It was a long shot anyway.” Greyson ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah, I’m staying here with her right now,” he said. “No way I’ll let this guy come back after them.” And then he told him about Kona bonding with the little boy.
Stone chuckled. “And that can be a problem,” he said. “When you get a dog like that, they are very protective,” he said. “So, in a way, it’s a good thing. It’ll be hard for the kidnapper to come back and grab that little boy again, as long as the dog is around. But you also have to consider that the guy might come back with a weapon next time and take out the dog first, when it takes a stand to protect the child.”
“I know. I was thinking about that too,” Greyson said. “I don’t have any weapons here myself.”
“The laws in Hawaii are different than in a lot of places,” Stone said.
“You and I both know that, if I wanted a weapon, I’d get it,” he said, his voice calm and low.
“And you and I both know,” Stone said, his voice equally calm, “that we don’t need to get weapons, right? We have weapons at our fingertips all the time.”
“Isn’t that the truth? Anyway, thanks so much for the satellite work. If you happen to run into any information on this guy, let us know.”
“Will do. I’m pretty sure Levi’s coordinating with Badger as it is.”
“I sure hope somebody is coordinating with the Hawaiian police,” he said, “because, at this point in time, it’s feeling like we’re on our own.”
“And again, sometimes that’s the best place to be,” Stone said. “Less people to report to, less people to give permission, less people to argue with about decisions. You know how it is.”
Even after Greyson hung up, he thought about that and realized it was one of the best things about doing something like this on a private level. He didn’t have to report in to anybody. As long as he kept on this side of the law, he wasn’t crossing anybody’s lines either. Of course the police wanted any information he got, and he was willing to share, but he also knew that they wouldn’t reciprocate. That’s the way the military func
tioned too. Or, for that matter, any law enforcement agency. One-way communication up the line. He put away his phone and grabbed his laptop from his duffel bag.
There had to be some way to find this guy. At least they had an ID, and they had the brother. Speaking of which, he quickly found a number for the brother at work.
When the brother answered the phone, he said, “Dennis, it’s Greyson. We met when your brother stole your truck. Where does Frank live?”
“Jesus, the cops are all over the place,” he said. “I wish to God my brother would just leave me alone.”
“He kidnapped a child,” Greyson reminded him, “and attacked two police officers.”
“Dumb shit,” Dennis muttered. “He’s always been a loose screw.”
“But he also has skills,” Greyson said. “Where and how?”
“Military black ops but then he was drummed out for bad behavior,” he said. “He went in young and took to the life a little too eagerly. Now that he’s out, he can’t quite let it go.”
“Is he going private?”
“If you mean, are his services for hire? Yes,” he said, “with an ugly side. Like I said, he’s a bit of a screwup.”
“What are his hangouts? Where am I likely to find him?”
The brother hesitated.
“If you don’t help,” he said, “you know perfectly well you’ll go down as an accomplice.”
“I didn’t do anything,” Dennis said.
“For all we know, you gave him that vehicle,” he said. “So that means you aided and abetted a criminal in the act of escaping, after assaulting two police officers and kidnapping a child.”
“God damn it,” he roared. “I didn’t have anything to do with any of it. This is all on my brother.”
“So, I’ll ask you again. Where am I likely to find him?”
“He gave up his apartment a few weeks ago. Told me how he had a big score happening, and, as soon as the job was done, he was leaving the island and was never coming back.”
“Any idea what the score was?”
“He wouldn’t say,” Dennis said.
By the time he finished checking in with Badger and calling the detective for any update on the case, he heard Danny waking up upstairs. Soon enough, the three of them trooped downstairs, Jessica carrying Danny with Kona ever vigilant at Danny’s side.