by WL Knightly
Roald took the paper, and when he read it, his face fell. “I don’t suppose I could persuade you to come back when we’re not so indisposed?”
Ethan gave him a look of regret that scrunched up half of his face. “No, sorry. I’ve tried that twice already. But please feel free to carry on like we’re not here. As you can see, we’ve both dressed for the occasion, so unless you make a scene, there won’t be one.”
“All we want to do is look at Cassie’s room,” said Sarah, giving Mr. Collier a pleading look. She wasn’t so sure why she felt so bad, but she didn’t like being a spectacle as much as Ethan seemed to enjoy it.
It didn’t make things better when Thomas approached to listen in.
“Do you want me to show them out?” asked the stranger. He cracked his knuckles as if to make himself look more intimidating.
“You’re welcome to try,” Ethan said with a smile.
“No,” said Roald Collier. “But Lana, you can show them to the room.” He pushed the warrant back at Ethan. “I trust you’ll leave when you’re done?”
Ethan nodded. “With pleasure.”
Roald Collier stormed away and went to appease a few more of the guests with his presence. The other man did the same but kept a sharp eye on the two of them as if they might suddenly go on a shooting spree.
Lana glared at Ethan. “Right this way.”
Ethan gave his usual charming grin as he walked up to where Thomas stood and offered his hand. “It’s good to see you again, Officer Asher. I didn’t realize you would be here.”
Thomas reluctantly gave him a handshake. “I’m an old friend of Collier’s. He used to represent my sister. But you probably already knew that.” He turned his eyes up at Sarah, and she could see the flaring of his nostrils that was never a good sign from him.
He seemed confident that Sarah was working as his informant, and he didn’t seem too pleased about it.
When Ethan walked past one of the servers, he took a drink and passed it to her. “Here you go, Sarah. There’s no reason you shouldn’t enjoy a drink while we’re here.”
She took the drink and followed as Lana led them to the back. As they rounded the corner, she glanced back to see Thomas was on her heels, and he lunged forward, grabbing her by the elbow and causing her to spill a little of the drink.
“What do you think you’re doing here?”
Ethan stopped at the door and looked back. “Sarah, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “I’ll catch up in a minute.”
Ethan nodded and went into the room with Lana. As soon as he was gone, she snatched her arm back. “Don’t you lay a hand on me. You don’t have any right to ask me anything about what I do.”
“Maybe not as a fiancé, but as an ex, I feel I should warn you, you’re treading on thin ice coming here and associating yourself with him and this case.”
“What do you care?”
“It’s for a story, isn’t it? You just couldn’t leave well enough alone.”
“There wouldn’t be a case without me. And I guess I know now why you tried to put me off of it. You knew it would lead back here where you and your mistress want your privacy.”
“She’s not a mistress. She never was. Not until you left.”
“Likely story. I know the truth, so don’t even bother.”
“You don’t need to get involved in this.”
“Are you?”
“I’m a cop. I have my business here. You don’t. All you’re going to find is a bullet. Trust me. If they find out what you are and what you do, what do you think they’ll do if one of them is involved? You know Lana will tell them just for spite. So, you had better hope your little FBI boyfriend can protect you, or else you had better keep an eye over your shoulder.” Thomas stormed away toward the room, and she followed, hoping she hadn’t missed anything important.
When she walked past him into the room, Lana left Ethan’s side and joined Thomas at the door. “Don’t take all night. Get busy. It’s not like I’m going anywhere.”
“It’s okay,” said Ethan. “I know I don’t mind an audience.” He turned and headed toward her dresser across the room, which was an exact match to the one in the photographs.
The whole place looked like some kind of playhouse for a living doll, and she had a feeling that Mr. Collier did more than promote them.
Despite the fact that Ethan liked the attention, she felt uncomfortable as she went to rifle through the girl’s things. But when she went to the girl’s bedside table, hoping she wouldn’t find another anal plug and ball gag like in Cassie’s other bedroom, she heard Lana clear her throat.
“Excuse me, but are you a cop?”
“Not officially.” She didn’t see the point.
“No, I didn’t think so. You’re just a loudmouth reporter, aren’t you? So, I’m afraid if Mr. FBI wants to crash my party with a search warrant, I’m going to need you to let him do his job without your help. Unless you have a special warrant too?”
“Maybe your boyfriend would like to help?” asked Ethan, giving Thomas a hard look.
“I’m off duty,” he said. “So, I’ll have to pass, but thanks for asking.”
“It’s okay,” said Ethan, pulling a phone from the back of the drawer. “I’m doing pretty good flying solo.” He tried to turn it on and found the battery was dead.
Lana’s eye widened. “That’s company property,” she said, taking a step forward. “She was supposed to turn that in.”
“Why would she turn in her cell phone?” asked Ethan.
Lana didn’t look as if she were happy to explain. “It’s an old one. She got a new one about a month ago. This one was supposed to be lost.”
“Well, this might have something important on it. So I think I’ll just hold on to it.”
“Fine,” said Lana. “Take it if you want. We’ve got nothing to hide here.” By her tone, she didn’t seem too believable.
“I will, thanks,” said Ethan as if he were unaware of Lana’s anger. Sarah was stuck watching him search, and now and then, she would glance back to see Lana hanging on Thomas, who couldn’t, for some reason, stop staring a hole through her.
Ethan went to the closet, and when he opened the door, he shouted, “Sarah, guess what?”
“What?” She glanced up, wondering what he had found.
“I found all of those missing clothes we talked about earlier.” He glanced back and winked at her, causing her to smile. He wasn’t taking it anywhere near the awful way she was. It was uncomfortable with the two of them staring her down, and she could still feel Thomas’s anger building by the second. He turned his attention to Lana. “You know, it was really strange how you didn’t tell me about the room here. In fact, you pointed me away from it by telling me about the apartment.”
“I just thought that if she had something going on I didn’t know about, she would have gone there.” She took hold of Thomas’s arm.
Ethan walked over to the bedside table and sat on the bed next to it. He opened the drawer and began to look through the drawers.
When he came up with nothing, he got to his feet and lifted up the mattress where he had just been sitting.
“Do you have to do that?” said Lana, rolling her eyes. “Don’t make a mess of Cassie’s room.”
Her voice breaking had Sarah looking her way. Lana was crying and wiping a single tear.
“Shouldn’t you be out there looking for her instead of disgracing her home?”
“For all we know, there is something here that could point us right to her.” He put the mattress down and walked over to the dresser again, where he pulled the drawer all of the way out and looked in behind it.
He did the same with the other, and when that came up with nothing, Sarah wondered if he would do the same with the others. “Try the bedside table,” she said. “Under the bottom drawer.”
That was where she had always kept her secret things.
Ethan took out the bottom drawer of the bedside t
able. He looked over at her and smiled. “Smart and beautiful,” he said. “I always knew you were the total package.”
As her cheeks flushed, he reached in and pulled out a gallon-sized plastic bag with two books inside, as well as a stack of photos and a small package of drugs. “Did you know about this?” he asked Lana.
From the look on her face, Sarah already knew the answer.
“No. I didn’t. What is it?” She looked at the bag in horror as he tucked it under his arm.
“It looks like a journal and a planner or address book of some kind.”
Lana didn’t have much to say.
“You seem upset. Is it because you didn’t find it earlier?” Ethan asked.
“I haven’t been in here today. I’ve been busy with the party.” She seemed insulted by the accusation.
“Did she get any of her mail here?”
“It’s in my office. I didn’t want it lying around for the other girls to get into. They have already been in her closet.”
“Sentimental bunch,” said Sarah.
“Shut up,” Lana snapped at her. “You don’t know them. And how dare you come back here to snoop around after what you did to Thomas, not to mention Starr’s memory?”
Sarah glared at the woman. “Did you tell him it was you, Lana? That it was you who spilled the beans in that bathroom about the two of you?”
Thomas gave Lana a sideward look as Sarah continued. “You got what you wanted. And I’ve got a little sister to support. Some of us have to work for a living.” She didn’t think Thomas knew the whole truth because she hadn’t stuck around to tell him what happened.
“You’re such a liar,” she said.
“Am I? You came into the bathroom after me. I heard what you told your friend when you pretended not to know I was there. You knew. That’s why you told her what you did. It wasn’t an accident.”
She turned her eyes to Thomas and smoothed down her hair. “Desperation doesn’t suit you, Sarah.”
Ethan cleared his throat as he tapped the plastic-encased books against his palm. “I think this will do just fine. I’ll have a team come in and do a more thorough search another time.”
Lana’s eyes widened, and she turned to Thomas. “He can’t do that, can he?”
“Yeah,” said Thomas, putting his hand on her shoulder. “Sure, he can.”
He glared at Sarah as she walked past him out of the room with Ethan. She couldn’t help but hope what they found was worth all of the trouble.
Chapter 17
Thomas
Lana followed the two uninvited guests back out the front, and Thomas excused himself and stepped into the guest restroom, where he waited at the door until he could no longer hear their footsteps echoing down the hall. Once he knew that they were gone and that there wasn’t anyone else in the hallway, he slipped out and went down the hall to where he knew Roald’s office to be.
He entered the large room, which was like two rooms in one. On one side, there was a television and sofa, where he could entertain, and on the other, his oversized desk that matched his ego. He hurried over to it as he took a small wireless surveillance device from his pocket. The tiny bug, as well as the one he’d already tucked away in the living-room smoke detector shortly after arriving early, was going to give him the inside access he needed to Roald’s mindset, and hopefully, that would lead him to more answers about his sister.
Now that the heat was off of Collier and his company, he hoped the man would speak freely and let his guard down about anything he might know about Starr’s disappearance.
He glanced up and realized that the pendant light above the desk just might be the smartest place to put it. He pulled out Roald’s chair and quickly stepped up on the desk to put it on the base.
Faint laughter in the hallway had him stepping down in a hurry, but by then, he had already gotten his bug in place.
Thomas went to the door to listen, and when the voices faded down the hall, he peeked out and stepped into the hallway as if nothing was going on.
Lana came into the hallway as soon as he reached the door back to the main room. “Can you believe the nerve of that guy?” she said. “And Sarah? Thank heavens they are gone now. It doesn’t make any sense for her to come here. It’s like she has it out for me or something.”
Thomas wasn’t going to get into it with her about Sarah. Whatever happened that night in the bathroom, Sarah had been mistaken. And it was too late to change that now. “Don’t let her get to you,” he said. “It’s standard procedure for the investigation that they talk to you. Next time, don’t underestimate them. As for Sarah, she’s just trying to get in on the story. That’s all she cares about anymore, apparently.”
“Well, Roald is livid. He’s upset that I didn’t warn him they might show up. As if I had any clue that he’d get the warrant in time.”
“Well, let’s go back and enjoy the party.” He knew the sooner it was over and the guests were gone, the better.
But that was going to happen a lot sooner than he expected. “What’s left of it, you mean. Half of the guests have already gone, and the rest are saying their goodbyes as we speak. To make it all worse, Roald told me he needed to see me after everyone leaves.”
Thomas put his hands on her shoulder and pulled her to him. “I should probably go and give you some time to deal with matters here.”
“I wish you could stay, but you’re probably right.” She looked up into his eyes as if she wanted to be kissed, and Thomas wasted no time giving her a brief one.
“Will you call me later?” she said when he pulled away.
“Yeah. I have a lot of work to do tomorrow anyway, but I’ll keep in touch.”
“I want to see you again soon.” She laced her fingers through his and kissed him once more. “I mean it.”
“I know.”
“You’re not still hung up on her, are you?” she asked as he stepped away. She kept hold of one hand and held it tight as if she didn’t want him to get away again.
“Who? Sarah?” He swallowed the bitter lump in his throat. “No. That’s over and done with.” It had to be. She was better off without him now. “Why would you say that?”
“Because of the way you look at her.”
He chuckled. “She makes me crazy. You know I couldn’t ever forgive her for what she did to my sister.”
“It was horrible what she wrote.”
“Yeah, well, horrible people eventually get what they deserve.”
She smiled as if she were an angel. “I wish you could stay.”
“Don’t get clingy on me.” He tried to unhinge her from his hand, but she moved in for one more kiss.
Thomas didn’t let it linger long and stepped away, glancing back only to give a quick goodbye.
Lana had that dreamy look in her eyes she had when they were first together, and he felt confident that he had already won her over.
When he went out front, he gave a quick goodbye to Roald and some of the others and wasted no time going out to his car, which he had parked next to Lana’s.
As he drove away, he took the main road to an overlook that was just about a mile away and pulled in to park.
He listened to the one-way surveillance through his phone and could tell when the guests had all gone when the conversation took a turn from farewells to heated questions.
“What did that man carry out of here?” Roald asked with a stern voice.
“It was a planner and a diary of some sort. Cassie had them well hidden in her room.” Lana’s voice was strained as if she were about to lose her temper or perhaps burst into tears.
“I thought I told you to sweep that room,” said Roald, who was growing more and more aggravated by the minute.
“I didn’t have time with everything else, and I told you I asked them to go and get a warrant. I had no idea he would come back here and crash the party.”
Roald seemed to turn his questions elsewhere as his tone changed. “What did you find out? Anything?�
�
“No,” said the deep voice of Bryan Howler. “I looked into every possibility I could think of and couldn’t find anything. Whatever happened, there’s no telling.”
“I just don’t want them snooping around here because of all of this.” Roald sounded as if he were exhausted. “Tell the other girls that we’re tightening curfews until this is resolved, and I don’t want any of them talking to anyone about Cassie. Are we clear?”
Lana’s voice gave a reply of assurance. “I’ll talk to them.”
“See if you can get Summer to step in and take up the slack with Cassie’s events.”
“She only had one more.”
Roald let out a sigh loud enough to pick up. “Well, for once, her lack of interest is a good thing. I guess I should be glad it wasn’t one of the other girls.”
“Someone did this to her and I don’t think it was just for fun,” said Howler.
“All I know is we didn’t have anything to do with it, and while I can sympathize with her family, this isn’t going to be good press for us. We just got cleared from the situation with Starr. I don’t want this to spark that heat again.”
Thomas ground his teeth at the sound of his sister’s name coming off the man’s lips. Roald was only glad the heat had been taken off of him because he really did have something to hide.
“Make sure Max keeps his nose clean for a while too. I don’t want him bringing in any extra heat. And you should probably stop seeing that cop. He’s just the link back to Starr we don’t need.”
“But we are dating each other. I’d think that would sit well with you. If people see that Thomas Asher hasn’t got any suspicions of us, then that does even more in our favor. Besides, we had a good thing going. I’d like to at least have a little more fun with him. We could use him to figure out what is going on in the case. He could be our ears and eyes.”
“Fine. But keep him out of my house. I don’t need him stumbling onto anything concerning the lodge.”
“I know. Don’t worry about it.”
“Of course, I worry about it!” snapped Roald.
“All I mean is that you should trust me by now.”