It took her almost three hours to do it, but she transferred every holding he had into accounts she set up in the Caribbean, using his knowledge of how to do it which she had collected from him too. She couldn't take his properties, but, relatively speaking, they were a small percentage of his wealth. He'd hurt when he discovered what she'd done.
And then she pulled the hidden switch under his desk and his bookcase swung open. She tapped the code on his safe and the door unclicked. Everything in the safe she scooped into the pillow sack, she already knew what it was. Malcolm was going to bleed. She dropped his laptop and net book resting on his desk into the pillowcase too. The last thing she did was return to his computer and type in the emergency sequence, the sequence Malcolm had set up so that if everything ever hit the fan he could fry his entire network, all of it, every piece of information about himself, his life, anything and everything, in one unrestorable cataclysmic debacle that wouldn't be disastrous for him because he had it all stored on simple flash drives in his hidden safe that Angelique had just looted.
And then she knew she should skedaddle. Dawn was approaching and she didn't know when his staff got up, best to go now. Angelique reached one last time into his desk and took out her cell phone, the lowlife had stolen it, he liked to read her messages in the comfort of his own study. She let herself out of the mansion, noiselessly shutting the door behind her and slung the pillowcase over her back yelping at the protest of her electrocuted muscles. She forced herself to trot down the driveway in the rain freshened air, up the road, and just as dawn began to peep over the treetops, she hit the first number programmed into her phone and put it up to her ear.
And miles away, Wyatt Cochran sat up eagerly in bed answering the phone recognizing Angelique's ringtone, gleeful and immensely relieved she'd kept her promise.
"Baby," he said in the magical looking early morning light, "you okay?"
"I will be," she sang through tears to him," I will be."
*****
Tracking Angelique's cell phone signal, Johnson roared the car up to Angelique by the side of the road slamming down the brakes in a spray of gravel. Both Wyatt and Johnson leapt out of the car to her before it finished moving.
"Tell me," Wyatt said vehemently, "tell me."
"We have to get out of here," she pleaded, "please!"
Not taking his arms from her, Wyatt pulled her to the car pushing her inside and sliding her over the seat, the contents of her pillowcase clattering to the floor. Johnson looked around furiously, got back into the driver's seat, and did an accelerated teeth clenching U-turn in the middle of the empty road.
"Now," Wyatt commanded.
"It was Malcolm," she said meekly. "And his driver, Donald. And his housekeeper, Margret, she was in on it too. Oh Wyatt, it's horrible. They got Lexa! He showed me the videos. What he did to her! He's... he's a monstrosity, Wyatt."
Wyatt's face had gone chalk white. Johnson was gripping the steering wheel hard enough to almost break it.
"WHAT DID HE DO TO YOU?"
"They kidnapped me out of the houseboat yesterday, Wyatt. They brought me to his mansion, locked me in a bedroom on the third floor. They left me there for a while, but I knew what Malcolm was --you'd told me. A sexual sadist. I knew what he would do to me. I was so terrified. And he came in. He put dinner on a table and wanted me to eat it with him watching videos of him torturing Lexa! She wasn't in Paris, Wyatt! He had her. All that time. Oh Wyatt, the things he did to her, you just don't know."
The problem was Wyatt did know. His uncle had tried to interest him in those activities. And that abomination from hell had had Angelique! His stomach turned over, a sickening fear swept through him right down to his testicles.
"I broke the TV screen and he punched me."
Johnson squelched a wail from the front seat and accidentally swerved the car into the oncoming lane for a moment.
"He beat me, Wyatt... I'm a mess. And... and... he..."
"Dead," Wyatt hissed, as Johnson thought not if I get there first.
"...he ripped my clothes off," Angelique finally managed to get out. "He threw me on the bed and he jumped on top of me but he wanted me to consent! To consent! But I wouldn't."
"He's mine, Johnson," Wyatt screamed aloud, "you don't take him he's MINE."
"NO SIR!" Johnson shook his head spoiling for the slaughter. "You take care of her, I take care of him."
"He told me he was going to come back in the evening and make me consent. Then he left. I didn't have any choice, Wyatt, I had to--"
Her voice choked off and Wyatt died for an instant desperately trying to hide his agony for her.
"You didn't do anything wrong, baby, it wasn't your fault. It was him. Not you."
"N... no... not that. I couldn't face that, Wyatt. I couldn't. So I... filled the bathtub... there was a hairdryer... and I... I didn't want to... l had no... leave you...." she was crying in great constricted incoherent sobs, unable to continue speaking. He clutched her tighter and with all his might fought for the self-control he knew he had to have right now, while he was with her, 'till he got to Malcolm.
"But he... he pulled me out of the tub after. He did that CPR stuff. I woke up and he told me if I ever tried it again he'd kill you. I passed out and woke up last night alone in the room."
"Oh my God, you tried to kill yourself? He's gonna suffer, he's gonna SUFFER--" It was like a machete, in his gut, twisting.
Angelique realized she'd skipped over the part about becoming spirit again and collecting the information of how to escape the room and all about Malcolm's security systems, financial holdings, safe, and computer. With a huge effort she gathered herself, she had to tread lightly here, carefully. She knew she was a terrible outright liar but if she stuck to the truth, omitting what she needed to, she might pull it off.
"I remembered what you said, Wyatt. About how Malcolm's favorite show is Phantom of The Opera, how he likes to pretend he's the Phantom. I read the novel. Do you know in the novel the Phantom builds a torture chamber? I'm thinking that's probably where Malcolm got the idea. But in the novel the Phantom puts a small escape lever in his torture chamber just in case he ever got trapped in it. I figured... Malcolm... you know, the same--"
"You found an escape lever?" Johnson exploded.
"It was up the chimney flue. And I got out, last night, everyone was asleep and I--"
"Last night? Last night?" Wyatt shouted, the battle to keep his self-control lost.
"I... I didn't leave right away. I went into his study and cleaned him out! I transferred his money into the Caribbean, I wrote down the account numbers, you'll have to do something about it. And I robbed everything out of his safe, it was where he kept the videos of the women he tortured. It wasn't just Lexa, Wyatt, he's been kidnapping people out of the Performance Center for years! That's the real reason he runs the place! And I stole his laptop and wrecked his computer system and I--"
"HOW DID YOU DO ALL THAT?"
There was dead silence in the car for several moments as Angelique scrabbled about in her brain for a believable explanation (i.e. a credible lie) and came up empty.
"After I electrocuted myself I was a spirit again for a moment and I collected the information from him," she babbled.
Wyatt and Johnson held their collective breaths. It wasn't possible. It was possible. It was. Wyatt squeezed his eyes closed for a moment. Johnson started silently crying, something he hadn't done in a decade, great tears cascading down his cheeks as he drove.
Angelique was an angel. An angel on Earth. Their angel.
Ours the thing above in the heavens whispered. Ours.
Wyatt and Johnson finally got Angelique home and the argument began. It wasn't a fair fight, neither Wyatt nor Johnson could stand up to her because she was so hurt. Bruised, burned, damaged. And she refused to go to a doctor until she had their promise.
"Wyatt," she said yet again, "I don't want him killed. You do that and I'm pretty sure you and I won't be going to the sa
me place for eternity and Malcolm Cochran is not worth that. And I don't want you killing him either Johnson."
"We are not going to let this go, Ange," Wyatt said. "Even if it wasn't about you--"
"Which it is," Johnson interrupted.
"--he has to be stopped. And this way, there'll be less pain for everyone he--"
"It's not what I want, Wyatt. Please. Let's just get Lexa and go to the police. I've already hurt him, I took most of his money."
Wyatt marveled at the ruthless sweet viciousness of feminine revenge. But it wasn't enough. And he wanted no public trial for Malcolm, he didn't deserve it, and it would hurt too many people. Better he was stopped Wyatt's way.
"Sir," Johnson suddenly said his eyes snapping wide open. "Containment!"
Wyatt sucked in his breath. He'd forgotten. In the heat of his fury, so had Johnson, but Johnson was right. Containment. The answer in the archives, the two angels who'd survived, their Protectors hadn't become evil to stop evil, they had contained the evil.
Wyatt took in a long deep breath willing himself back under control.
"All right Angelique, no killing. Don't worry about anything. Johnson and I will take care of things. Can do?" he asked Johnson.
"Oh yes," Johnson answered. "Though it'll take a lot of restraint. From all of us."
"What?" Angelique asked. "What will you do?"
"I will tell you what we are all going to do, but not until you have been checked out by the doctor."
"I told you, I'm a fast healer."
"That's good, baby, because you will not be leaving this house again until the doctor says you are perfectly fine."
She looked at him and the emotional and physical avalanche hit as both Wyatt and Johnson had known it would. Angelique's poor drowned, paddled, drugged, battered, electrocuted body finally threw in the towel and she dissolved. Bursting into tears she held onto Wyatt as he rocked her.
"Get the doctor," he mouthed to Johnson. Wyatt needed to take care of his wife. He began stroking her hair, it's effect immediate and welcome. As he lured her down into trancelike tranquility, Wyatt concocted the plan to contain Malcolm Cochran and Donald. Just for the maliciousness of it, he would use Malcolm's own money Angelique had stolen to finance the whole thing. The housekeeper, she would simply find herself waking up back in her own country.
And compared to what was going to happen to Malcolm and Donald, for that, Wyatt knew, she should thank her lucky stars.
*****
Malcolm Cochran woke up early, in a bad mood, disturbed. But instantly he remembered there was a very delectable outlet for his bad mood anxiously anticipating his return upstairs. He dressed quickly and walked to the hallway finding the door to the third floor unlatched. WTF!? That addlebrained Margret had probably been vacuuming the stairway, forgotten to lock it. What if Tinka had gone up there? Margret, he curled his lips, would be on her knees blubbering fearful apologies to him before he was done with her for this one. His bad mood increased in spades but it was nothing, nothing, to what he felt when he came to the secure chamber and saw what he saw.
The door. Wide open.
It can't be was all his stunned mind could repeat at him, over and over. Not possible he bawled in outraged bewilderment to nothing more than a few dust motes floating in the air illuminated by sunshine from his million dollar window.
Whatever he's paying you I'll double.
For some reason Ira Silverberg's enigmatic entreaty shotgunned through Malcolm's brain. This was Angelique he'd taken. How many times had he told himself there was something different about her? You should have...
A hundred should-haves cascaded through him. Chained her to the bed. Drugged her. Moved her to a small island. Why hadn't he done something like that? Stupid, stupid, stupid! For a moment he thought --wait! maybe she's still in there, hiding-- until some part of his brain devolved and called him something it hadn't in many many years, not since he'd built his secure chamber in fact.
YOU MORON!
She was gone. Straight to Wyatt undoubtedly. He could go look for her but that, he knew, would be a waste of time and he didn't have time. He had to flee. Wyatt would be after him and not rest until he was ... he didn't want to think about that.
Malcolm turned and raced back to his room seizing his cell phone, yelling into it as he frantically rushed about his room throwing his passport, some clothes, a few basics of what he'd need into a small bag. The imbecile on the other end of the phone couldn't understand him.
Jet! Plane! RIGHT NOW! I have an account with you people this is an emergency you fool wake up!
Finally the leasing agent got it, Yes Mr. Cochran we can have a jet ready for you in forty-five minutes. Where will you be going?
"France," he answered. He had a chateau in France and France had some of the best anti-extradition laws in the world, the country that had shielded a famous American rapist for years.
I am not a rapist he screamed to himself as he plunged down the stairs to his study, I get their consent!
What he saw in his study almost killed him on the spot. His bookcase was swung wide, his safe door open.
And empty.
How could she have done that?
His eyes fell on his computer and he knew in his soul there was even worse to come. Like a walking corpse he rounded his desk and tried to turn his computer on. Nothing. She'd destroyed his computer. His records in his safe were gone. His eyes swept over the desk looking for his laptop, his net book, of course they weren't there. It was only then that his eyes registered the small yellow sticky note affixed to the top of his computer and he read its message.
FATE LINKS HIM TO ME FOREVER AND A DAY!
She'd read the godamned book! Phantom of the Opera. She'd figured out there was an escape lever! He yowled. The great Malcolm Cochran opened his mouth and yowled. That BITCH! He would find a way. Somehow, someway, he would bring her to her knees. He would get himself situated safely in France and then he would spare no expense in retrieving her, his property, his entitlement and FUCKING OBLITERATE HER.
Malcolm Cochran did not yet know that his resources had been reduced by more than ninety percent and "sparing no expense" was now a totally empty pipedream for him. But he would find out soon enough. He did, after all, still have his cell phone and though he couldn't get into his accounts with it, he could check their recent activity, something he did just before he boarded the rented jet for France.
And when he did, Malcolm Cochran looked so ashen that the pilot was afraid the man had had a coronary. Malcolm didn't know it yet, but he probably would have been better off if he had.
Chapter Thirteen
Malcolm waited nervously for Wyatt and Angelique's arrival. For the umpteenth time he checked to make sure his security guards, disguised as party guests, were in place. Tinka, he saw, was by the door just in front of the metal detectors greeting the new arrivals as they were screened. Maureen was by the hors d' oeuvres being dutifully served a canapé by Margret. Beth was chattering away with some people he didn't recognize in a side room, and he didn't know where George was, whether he'd even come. Damn, this was driving him up the wall.
He had spent months in France, and weeks now he'd been back. And in all of it no complaint from Wyatt, not even an aggressive peep.
It had been all downhill for Malcolm. The damage Angelique had done to his holdings had been massive and he'd been able to reclaim none of it. He'd been forced to liquidate all his properties except this, his mansion, and the Performing Center, which paid for itself. He was still wealthy, but he now had nowhere near the resources Wyatt could command. And the bills for his security had been enormous.
His sudden flight he'd explained only in cryptic terms that he'd received a seemingly credible threat to his safety from a deranged individual. He gave out no information except a few hints that the person was a Performing Center failure. Tinka and Maureen had both flown to France attempting to extract more information from him but he had revealed nothing. Donald and
Margret he had left behind, his canaries in the coal mine. If Wyatt was coming, they were exposed and expendable, let Wyatt tip his hand by taking them down first. But nothing had happened to them, they simply continued on at the mansion untouched.
The detectives he'd hired to watch Angelique had also been expensive, with little to show for it. He hadn't had her watched before the abduction like he had with his other "guests," so he didn't know what a normal living pattern for her was, he had nothing to compare her current behavior to. The detectives informed him of her activities --by herself she mostly went hang gliding and to the Performance Center. She wasn't performing anymore but that was to be expected, she was a Cochran now, for sure Wyatt had stopped that. She went to social functions with Wyatt and out to dinner with him, the detectives sent him photographs of her. In the photos she was smiling, happy, relaxed and so was Wyatt. From Beth and Tinka he learned that Wyatt had talked her into creating an album of symphonies Wyatt wanted to produce and market, that was what she was now doing.
Malcolm knew Wyatt well and could not fathom how Wyatt could make no move if he knew what he'd done to Angelique. But Wyatt had even sent him a note for his birthday with a scribbled inscription "hope you're safe and it all gets worked out soon," along with a very expensive bottle of cognac. Not the action of an enraged husband. He'd even "volunteered" Maureen to run the Performance Center for him while he was away, a position Maureen had eagerly seized and showed no sign of relinquishing.
And so, with no threat appearing, Malcolm's homesickness had won out and he had taken a tentative step back into his world, albeit surrounding himself with guards, security and surveillance, all the while looking for one sign, some clue, that Wyatt knew.
Because if Wyatt knew what he'd done to Angelique, there would be an open crusade against him not ending until... what? Would Wyatt kill him? Ruin him (what was left of him anyway) surely, but kill him? Malcolm had watched Wyatt grow up and Malcolm's answer to this question was yes. Yes, Wyatt would kill him. Not a contracted hit, but by himself, with his own hands. But Wyatt had done nothing. Nothing! Malcolm had only one possible explanation for this.
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