A Bid for Love

by Rachel Ann Nunes

  Once at the house, she couldn’t park in the garage because it was filled with boxes from Jared’s apartment in New York. For nearly three months they had sat there, growing dusty, but tomorrow Jared planned to start moving them inside.

  Cassi slid from the car, adjusting her gray skirt and retrieving her matching fitted jacket from the passenger seat. She glanced up and down the street to make sure Jared’s new red Camry was nowhere in sight. He had a key to the house, so it was possible he had come over to make her dinner—he knew she hated to cook.

  The car was nowhere in sight. “Looks like it’s microwave dinner time,” she said.

  The instant Cassi walked through the door, she felt something wasn’t right. What was it? Her heart began an all-too-familiar pounding. This was how she had felt three months ago when she and Jared had captured would-be thieves and exposed Jared’s boss, Laranda Garrettson, as a smuggler.

  “Jared?” she called.

  There was no answer.

  “This isn’t funny! Jared?”

  Silence.

  She walked into the living room and scanned its contents. Nothing was where it had been when she left this morning. The couches had been moved. Vases and knickknacks had traded places. Even the books had been taken from the shelves and lined up on the floor. The disarray wasn’t messy, but deliberate, methodical.

  Cassi’s breath came more quickly. Who had been here? Jared? Was he moving his things in now?

  Her gaze landed on the answering machine on its stand next to the tall flowered vase by the arched doorway. A red light flashed at her, signaling a new message. Mechanically, Cassi punched the button and waited. Was it Jared? Be Jared, she pleaded silently.

  She heard a series of beeps and then, “Cassi, this is Renae. Please, please, call me when you get a minute. I really need to talk to you.”

  Cassi hardy heard the words through her disappointment. She tossed her suit jacket onto the sofa and with a shaky hand picked up the flowered vase from its stand, holding it in front of her to use as a weapon if necessary. The long bunches of dried flowers inside the vase fell to the carpet.

  In the kitchen she found the same disorder, but this time damage had been done, as though someone had grown careless. The cupboards and drawers gaped open, piles of broken dishes lay on the counter top, silverware spread across the table, and her clean linens were strewn across the ceramic tile.

  Jared didn’t do this.

  She knew exactly what she should do: run and get help. But a feeling of defilement urged her deeper into the house. How dare someone violate her privacy! How dare they touch and ruin her things!

  Still clutching the vase, she quietly crept through the rest of the house. The living room, the bathroom, the spare bedroom, the library—everywhere she met the same terrible disorder. In the master bedroom, the devastation was the worst. Everything in the closets and drawers had been scattered around the room as though by children in unsupervised play. Sheets had been ripped, blankets thrown onto the floor. Her bra hung from a hook that had once supported the curtains. The horrific focal point of the room was the waterbed, with her long kitchen knife stabbed into the middle. A white piece of paper floated in the leaking water.

  Cassi peeked into the master bathroom to make sure she was alone. She was too scared to cry and too weak to run. Feeling compelled, she approached the bed, keeping an eye on the door to the hall. What did the note say?

  The vase in her hands became suddenly heavy, and she set it gently on top of the wrinkled curtains by the bed. As she retrieved the white paper, it tore in her hands, and she had to lay it, piece by soggy piece, on the dresser to read what it said:

  We know you have it, Landine. We want it now.

  Landine. Jared? This note was meant for Jared!

  Cassi’s knees buckled, but she caught herself by leaning on the dresser for support.

  Questions assaulted her. What did Jared have? Why were they looking for it here? What was going on? And most importantly, where was Jared?

  There were no answers on the paper or in the horrible mess of her house. With a hand to her mouth, Cassi darted out of the bedroom, through the house, and out the door. She was in the car and driving before she even realized she had picked up her car keys.

  Where should I go?

  Jared’s. She had to find and warn him.

  Of what? What has Jared stumbled onto now?

  Cassi felt angry and afraid. Tears slipped from the corners of her eyes, but she scarcely noticed.

  And why didn’t he tell me! her heart screamed in angry protest.

  By the time she reached Jared’s studio apartment, three blocks away, her anger had calmed. She remembered Jared’s face, his sandy blond hair, the look in his blue eyes when he held her. He loves me, she thought, and I have to trust him.

  There was no answer at Jared’s door, so she used the key he had given her. She entered his small studio apartment cautiously, poised for flight, but it took only minutes to determine that she was alone. At least Jared wasn’t lying on the floor unconscious—or worse.

  Cassi scanned the room, expecting to find the same terrible disaster she had found at her house. She figured that whoever had been at her place would have come here first, and when they hadn’t found what they were looking for, they must have believed that Jared had left the object with her. By ransacking her house, they had hoped to get lucky.

  But Cassi found nothing out of place in Jared’s apartment. In the kitchen, the dishes were washed, the bed was freshly made, and the floor vacuumed. In fact, everything seemed neater than she remembered it, as though Jared had recently finished cleaning. Folded packing boxes lined the wall, but other than this there was no sign the occupant was soon moving.

  She paced the carpet, talking aloud to herself. “Why wouldn’t they come here first? I don’t understand.” She thought a moment more. “Let’s see . . . there’s something wrong with this apartment. It’s so clean. That’s not so odd, though. Jared likes vacuuming. And he told me he normally picks up before he goes to bed—” Cassi glanced at the bed. “The bed’s made, so either he cleaned up after he made the bed this morning, or he cleaned up last night before going to bed and then went out for some reason, and didn’t return.”

  The jumble of thoughts rushed on, and Cassi tried to clear her head of them. With each moment, she grew increasingly uneasy. What bothered her most was that her apartment had been noticeably searched, while Jared’s had not. Of course if Jared’s apartment had been searched by professionals, she probably wouldn’t be able to tell. But then why leave the mess at her apartment? To scare her? To scare Jared into giving up whatever it was they wanted?

  Maybe. He would try to protect her.

  “You’ve read too many novels,” she said to the empty room, then settled on the couch to wait for Jared. He had to be back soon.

  A faint, regular ticking penetrated her thoughts. She glanced around but could see no clock.

  Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock.

  Finally she bounced up from the couch and began to search in drawers, cupboards, and cubbyholes. Where was that ticking coming from?

  A bomb! she thought.

  Ridiculous.

  Her search pace increased. When she found a large-faced Mickey Mouse clock in the top drawer of the bulky nightstand by Jared’s bed, she sighed with relief. Replacing the smiling timepiece, she slumped to the bed and let her head sink into her hands. After a while, she turned her head and studied the nightstand.

  It was an heirloom from Jared’s great-grandfather, made by his own hands. She had teased him about getting rid of it when they had moved his furniture into the apartment. “It’s pretty big,” she had said. “I don’t know if it’ll fit in my room.”

  He laughed. “It is rather wide, but it’s the only thing I have of my great-grandfather. He made more furniture, but I got to pick only one piece. Each of us got one when my grandma died. It was her father who made them.” He fingered the smooth grain on the nightstand.
“This was the smallest piece.”

  “Your sisters got to pick first, eh?” Cassi said. Jared had four sisters and one brother.

  “Actually, I drew the longest straw to pick first,” Jared said. “No one could understand why I passed up the bed frame or the china cabinet. They were the real beauties.”

  With Jared watching her, Cassi had stepped back and taken another look at the nightstand. It was made of oak and looked solid, but was rather plain overall. Still, Jared shared her profession as an art buyer, and he should know value when he saw it. What was she missing? “Well, why did you pick it?” she’d asked finally.

  Jared grinned and winked at her. “Because there’s a secret to it. But I’m not telling what. No one knows but me. Not even my grandmother knew. You’ll have to discover it for yourself.”

  “Come on, tell me.” She tried to punch him.

  He danced out of her way. “Nope. It’ll tell you itself one day.”

  She caught up to him, but before she could say anything, he held her close and kissed her.

  In the passion of the moment, she had completely forgotten the nightstand.

  Until now.

  Did it hold some clue to Jared’s disappearance? It seemed unlikely, and yet . . .

  I have nothing better to do, she reasoned silently. She was actually relieved not to think about what had happened in her house and the police report she would have to fill out. That could wait.

  Cassi slid to her knees and opened the drawer. The Mickey clock smiled at her blankly. Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock. She put a hand inside the drawer and felt around, then tested the thickness of the drawer bottom. No hidden compartment there, no letter taped to the underside, nothing to tell her this was anything other than an ordinary homemade nightstand.

  There was another drawer and a larger cupboard below to search, but they were equally unrevealing. Cassi closed the cupboard and stared again. With effort, she pulled the stand out from the bed and examined its back and sides. Still nothing. Could the answer be on the bottom? But how could she check? It was much too heavy to turn over, and she might damage it while trying.

  She re-opened one of the drawers, and a slow smile spread across her face. “Just maybe,” she said. With a gentle tug, the drawer came loose and she held it up against the side of the nightstand. Sure enough, it was three inches shorter than the stand itself. Cassi placed the drawer on Jared’s bed, removed the other drawer, and opened the cupboard door underneath.

  “There’s no opening in the back, so it has to be inside,” she said. It felt comforting to hear a voice in the room, even if it was only her own.

  On the left, near the back of the wooden side support for the second drawer, Cassi found a tiny, flat hook. If she hadn’t been aware that there was something different about the nightstand, and therefore looking carefully, she would have never found it at all. She flipped it over, and the top part of the back panel swung open. “Ah-hah!” she exclaimed.

  Cassi eagerly delved into the depths of the hidden space, but her hand met only wood and cobwebs. Stifling a shudder, she inched her hand down toward the lower part, her arm scraping against the wood. Her fingers hit something and she drew it out—a thick pile of letters, yellow with age. Probably letters between Jared’s great-grandparents, Cassi thought, reading the names. What a treasure!

  A vision came to her of Jared as a little boy, discovering this secret. His sparkling blue eyes would have been distinctive, even then. She could hear his delighted laugh, his indecision about whether or not to keep the find to himself.

  Was there more? She felt again and heard a clanging noise. Keys!

  She drew them out and stared, recognizing them at once. They were Jared’s. “Why on earth did he put them here?”

  An extra set? No, her house key was on the ring, the shiny new copy she had made for him only a few weeks before. Why had he put them where no one would ever find them except for himself and perhaps her—if she even chose to look? Why would she look? Unless . . . unless Jared turned up missing.

  Cassi’s heart again thudded wildly in her chest. “Calm down,” she told herself. “Jared couldn’t possibly know you would come here and find these. He must have hidden them here so—” The alternative was even worse. Had Jared thrown them there at the last minute to hide them from an unwanted visitor? Perhaps the same people who had ransacked her house? Did they have Jared even now?

  No, they’d left Jared a note. Why would they do that if they had taken him?

  “He’ll be coming home any minute,” she said to the Mickey Mouse clock on the bed, but her voice came as a frightened whisper.

  Mechanically, Cassi put the nightstand back together and slipped Jared’s keys into her purse. I’ll go ask Linden what he thinks. It’ll be better than talking to Mickey Mouse.

  For the first time since she met Jared, she wished her family lived near her in California instead of in Utah. Her brother Robert, a police officer in Provo, would know what to do about her house. Maybe she should call him.

  No, Linden had connections with the FBI, and she could trust him as much as Robert. He’d know what to do about Jared and the note.

  In the parking lot next to Jared’s apartment building, she searched for his car and found it stationed between two trucks. Had he even driven it since she’d seen him yesterday at dinner? There was no way of knowing.

  Feeling self-conscious, she checked the keys on the ring and found the one that matched his car. “Car, house, apartment—that leaves five more keys. They could be to anything.” She knew he had several wooden chests in her garage, but they couldn’t possibly be related to his disappearance. He hadn’t so much as been in her garage since he moved into the studio apartment. They had moved in only the necessities, knowing that he would soon be living at the house anyway.

  Maybe he had a private locker somewhere. Or a box at some bus or train station. Did those still exist?

  “Stop it,” she told herself. “The only box Jared has is a P.O. box.” That made her examine the keys more thoroughly. Which one was it? She spied a gold one that read: U.S.P.S. DO NOT DUPLICATE.

  Setting her lips in frustration, Cassi started her car and drove toward the freeway. Where was Jared? The note on her bed implied that he had something someone wanted, so obviously they didn’t know where it or he was. Jared must still have it—and that meant he could return at any moment.

  But from where? And how could he have left without his keys or his car? The most worrisome problem, of course, was why he had hidden the keys in the nightstand. It didn’t make sense unless they were important.

  I have to know, she thought. Stifling the rational voice inside her that urged her to Linden’s, she left the freeway and headed in the opposite direction.

  It took her twenty minutes to arrive at the post office nearest her home. The late summer sun had begun to set, sending sprays of red light across the western sky. It was beautiful, but Cassi hurried inside the post office, not giving nature’s artwork a second look. She had been with Jared to check the box before, but couldn’t remember exactly which was his. To make matters worse, the key didn’t have a number stamped on it—a protection in case it was ever lost, she supposed.

  She began trying the key in all the boxes, glad that she was alone. The post office glowed with faint fluorescent lighting, but it wasn’t dark enough yet for her to worry about being watched from the shadows of trees outside the large windows.

  Why would she think of that? Shrugging off the odd feeling, Cassi concentrated on her work. At last the key turned in a lock. Inside, she found junk mail and a thin manila envelope addressed to Jared. She didn’t recognize the bold writing, but as she glanced at the return address in Covina, she saw that it was from her long-time friend, Renae—or perhaps from Renae’s husband, Trent. What either might send to Jared completely escaped her. Regardless, it wouldn’t tell her where Jared was or why he was missing.

  Loneliness fell like a heavy shroud on Cassi’s shoulders, and she des
perately wished Jared was with her. What if something serious had happened to him? What if she never saw him again? The events of the day came rushing back—broken dishes, neatly placed books, the knife sticking out of her waterbed—and she had to tighten her jaw to control her emotions.

  Something was dreadfully wrong.

  Without paying attention to anything around her, she made her way back to the car and onto the freeway, heading toward Linden’s. Please be there, she thought.

  The manila envelope on the seat slipped to the floor. Cassi let it stay where it fell.

  END OF SAMPLE CHAPTER. Please visit the your ebook store to purchase Framed For Love, or continue to the next page to learn more about the author and her books.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Rachel Ann Nunes learned to read when she was four, beginning a lifetime fascination with the written word. She still reads everything she can lay hands on, from children’s stories to science articles.

  She began writing in the seventh grade and is now the author of over thirty published books, including the popular Ariana series, The Huntington Family series, Eyes of a Stranger, and Saving Madeline. Her novel Before I Say Goodbye won the 2011 Whitney Award in the general fiction category. Imprints, An Autumn Rain Novel (2010), Fields of Home (2008), and The Independence Club (2007) were all Whitney Award Finalists.

  Rachel and her husband, TJ, live in Utah Valley and are the parents of seven awesome children—three boys and four girls. Rachel writes Monday through Friday in a home office, taking frequent breaks to read or swim with her kids.

  To read about upcoming books, visit Rachel’s website at http://www.RachelAnnNunes.com.

  BOOKS BY RACHEL ANN NUNES

  Autumn Rain Novels (Paranormal Romance)

  Imprints

  Shades of Gray