Dangerous Attraction Romantic Suspense Boxed Set (96 page)

While Chad and Jack talked, Mabry stepped out the door and asked Jack’s secretary to get Andrew right away. Minutes later, as Jack paced back and forth, knowing in his gut that Kelly was in danger because of him, Andrew slipped into the office and got a quick update from Chad.

Jack was cursing himself for putting Kelly in danger because the only explanation now, if someone had her…was they were after his money. If he hadn’t married her, she wouldn’t have been a target connected to him; there would be no reason for anyone to take her. And, if he had taken this threat more seriously, like he should have in the beginning, she would have had a bodyguard right next to her instead of down the street. Jack wouldn’t forgive himself if something happened to the woman he loved.

Chad’s phone rang and he answered it to get a report from his man in the field. His face was grim when he hung up the phone.

“He found Kelly’s purse by the back door of the clinic and her car is still parked out front. Her phone and alarm are still in her purse,” Chad reported.

“Then no GPS to track her,” Jack added.

“One of the staff at the clinic said that Kelly took the garbage out to the dumpster on her way out this afternoon so she left by the back door. She should have walked down the alley and around to her car out front. It looks like someone grabbed her in the back alley. She probably didn’t have time to go for her panic alarm,” Chad continued.

Jack felt like he had been shot in the gut. He should have increased her security as soon as Chad had found out about the rotating license plates instead of waiting to talk to her tonight. He had just found Kelly. He couldn’t lose her now when he finally knew what it was like to live your life with someone else,
for
someone else, instead of being alone. He couldn’t imagine his world without her.

Chad continued to bark out assignments and took charge of the situation as his military training had taught him to do. “Andrew, I want you to begin to liquidate assets and free up as much cash as you can in case we get a ransom demand. Mom, contact Kelly’s family and get them over to Jack’s house so we can have everyone in one place. Send the car service to get all of them, wherever they are.

“Jack, you head home now in case there’s a ransom demand before I get there with tech support. I’m going to check in with some contacts I have at the New Haven Police Department and FBI. I’ll be a few minutes behind you.”

They all turned and rushed out of the office to set up base at Jack’s house.

* * *

Kelly’s head was throbbing when she woke and she felt nauseated and confused. She tried to shake the foggy feeling in her head and the cotton feeling in her mouth. Panic set in when she realized her hands and feet were bound with thick layers of duct tape and she was in a room she didn’t recognize. Kelly felt as though a band was tightening over her chest, suffocating her and she struggled to breathe as waves of panic swept over her and bile burned at the base of her throat.

She was lying on the floor in a typical bedroom; a bit small. It was daylight out. There was a twin-sized bed, and a torn-up upholstered chair in the corner, but that was it. The room was bare, other than those two pieces of furniture.

Kelly fought to pull details from her mind, grasping at threads of memory so thin they seemed to fall from her memory before she could see where they went. She closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths and pictured herself earlier in the day. It would have been noon when she was grabbed. She had left the clinic at noon.

She could remember walking out the back door of the clinic. Denise had asked her to take the trash to the dumpster on her way out so she left through the back door even though her car was parked out front. Out front, where her security detail would have been.

She struggled to remember, but felt like there were holes in her mind, like her brain wasn’t quite functioning right. She could remember someone coming at her from behind as she walked out into the alley, then a strong, sweet smell filled her nose and overwhelmed her before she blacked out. Nothing about the memory seemed right, like trying to put together pieces of different puzzles.

Tears were flowing freely now. Kelly could picture four men surrounding her and she remembered seeing a van before she passed out. The men had worn masks….

Staying calm was no longer an option. Fresh waves of sheer terror bolted through Kelly’s body. She closed her eyes tight and tried desperately to calm herself, but she had never felt a level of dread and utter anguish like this. Her mind started running through all the ways that this could end, each image sending her into further panic until she felt like she would choke on the fear. Then one image stopped her catapult into darkness. Jack.

Jack taking her in his arms. Jack holding her, safe again. Kelly didn’t know if Jack’s Aunt Mabry was responsible for this or not, but she knew one thing. Jack would find her.

Kelly latched onto that image and tried to take deep breaths. You can do this. You need to stay calm and figure out how to get yourself out of here.

Kelly looked around and assessed the room. Kelly heard muffled voices outside the door to the room. It sounded as if all four of the men were out there but she couldn’t hear what they were saying. She did hear the sound of a television as it played in the next room. Kelly hoped that would mask any sound she made as she tried to move and release her bonds.

Kelly tried to stay as quiet as she could so they didn’t realize she was awake. She studied her surroundings and tried to understand her circumstances. She was sitting on the floor with heavy layers of duct tape around her ankles and wrists. There was tape over her mouth too. Thankful that they had bound her hands in front of her body instead of behind her back, she found she was able to use her hands a bit. She reached up with her hands and pressed her lips together to fight the urge to cry out, and pulled the tape from her mouth. She left the flap of it hanging from one corner so that she could put it back if they came in.

Kelly began to take inventory of the room. Is there anything I can use to get out of here? Look around, Kelly. Focus.

Swallowing another wave of panic, she saw how little furniture there was in the room, how hopeless her situation was. Kelly again forced herself to take deep slow breaths. She needed to look out the window.

Kelly lay down again and began to roll sideways, moving herself slowly and quietly toward the window. She was methodical in her movements to avoid making noise. She rolled up onto her knees and placed her bound hands onto the windowsill and levered herself up to look out the window. It had been nailed shut.

She appeared to be up on the third floor of what looked like a small apartment building. She could tell because there was another, similar building across the street. Kelly wondered if she could signal anyone over there but she didn’t see any movement in the windows. It was hard to hold herself up at the window with her ankles bound so tightly, but she made a mental note to look out the window again every fifteen minutes to try to get someone’s attention.

Kelly turned and sat on the floor, leaning her back against the wall. There were two other doors in the room in addition to the door leading to the voices. After resting for a few minutes, Kelly rolled over to one of them.

A closet. Empty.

Kelly rolled to the next door and opened it. A bathroom. It was as empty as the rest of the apartment. No shower curtain. No towels or bathmat. Kelly took a deep breath and rolled to her knees, put her hands onto the sink and pulled herself up. She hopped up onto her feet and bumped her lip on the corner of the sink. She swallowed the urge to yelp at the pain and shoved open the medicine cabinet above the sink. Empty. Kelly pushed down another wave of panic and reminded herself to be methodical, cautious…to think.

Kelly crouched back down and rested on her heels.
Think, Kelly,
think.
That was her mantra now, to keep her focused and calm. Kelly looked up at the sink. It could provide a long-shot possibility; there was no other way to get out. Kelly remembered watching a child safety video when she was little. Their parents played it for her and her sister and brothers all the time. It had this cheesy caped safety hero who taught safety for kids. Kelly had a sudden memory of a scene in the movie.

The sink. Turn on the taps and let the water run over to flood the apartment below
. She thought about it for a minute. She would need to turn it on low so the men outside the door wouldn’t hear the water running. And she had to fill the safety drain hole in the basin by the wall. Balled up toilet paper did the trick. She just hoped she had enough time for it to overflow if it poured at such a low rate – and that there was someone below to see it.

She figured she could listen to the kidnappers and come turn the flow up or try to break a window and call for help if she heard them leave the main area. That seemed like a long shot, though, because there were four of them. It was unlikely they would all leave at once so Kelly knew her best chance was to focus on silent ways to alert others of her location. The open sink faucet might be her only shot.

Kelly turned the tap on low and plugged the drain, then rolled back into the bedroom and lay back down where they had left her. She put the tape back onto her mouth and closed her eyes, and tried to picture Jack. She squeezed her eyes shut as tightly as she could and blocked out the fear by picturing herself back in Jack’s arms.

Chapter Thirty-six

Chad had set up shop in Jack’s living room and he, Jack, and Andrew were working every angle possible to locate Kelly and get her back but there were virtually no leads. Kelly’s family had been brought to the house and Mrs. Poole was doing all she could to comfort them but there was not much comfort for them – and there wouldn’t be – until Kelly was found. Her mother was as white as a sheet, sitting there surrounded by her husband and Kelly’s siblings but she was as strong as Kelly and was holding herself together as they waited for news.

Jack didn’t think he had ever felt so afraid in his life. Or so angry. He had just found Kelly. They had just started their life together. He hadn’t even told her that he loved her or that he wanted their marriage to be real. He needed time with her. He needed her in his life. If he got his hands on the people who’d taken her from him, he really believed he would rip them apart with his bare hands. It was a level of anger and hate he never imagined he could feel.

Chad got off the phone with one of his connections at the FBI. “Jack, it’s not good news. This afternoon, four other women were grabbed, all within the span of three hours. They’re all wealthy young women about Kelly’s age. The FBI have been called in to all of the other families’ homes. Since we haven’t officially reported Kelly’s disappearance yet, we can keep them out of it for now – if that’s what you want to do.”

Chad leveled a steady gaze at Jack as he delivered the blow. “The FBI has seen this type of kidnapping in two other cities with the same M.O. in the last year. Human trafficking is likely the only reason to grab more than one woman at the same time. The FBI doesn’t expect a ransom call but they’ve set up traces at the other homes, just in case. I’ve got Sam here and she can trace any call that comes in here if we get one, but the FBI thinks whoever grabbed the women has plans for them.” Chad paused, wishing he didn’t have to say this to his cousin about the woman he loved, but he knew the best thing he could do for Jack was tell it to him straight.

Suddenly Jack couldn’t hear anything, couldn’t see anything. He was completely and totally blinded by his rage and he felt a sickening desperation. He had to find Kelly and bring her back safely. He had never known such fear mixed with the anger. Had never before literally tasted hate and fear on his tongue as he struggled to just breathe, to keep going. Jack thought vaguely that this must have been what his aunt felt when her husband left and he suddenly began to understand the poison that had taken over her. All he could do now was to keep going, to hold on. He’d keep going until he found Kelly.

The room was quiet for a few long seconds before Chad went on, the only sound was the wracking sobs of Kelly’s mom sitting on the couch. Her resolve had finally broken when she heard Chad’s words. Jack couldn’t imagine the pain she felt at hearing that her daughter had been taken like this. He desperately wanted to take away that pain by bringing Kelly back to her mother’s arms.

“The FBI will likely be here shortly, but the reality is, you have the right to refuse their assistance. I suggest we work on our own instead of with the FBI. If we work with them we’re constrained by the law. We have a better shot at getting Kelly back if we aren’t restricted. I can use my contacts to find out everything the FBI knows and what they’re doing to find Kelly, so we still get a lot of the benefit of working with them, but we can move outside the law if we need to.”

Jack looked at Chad as an eerie calm moved through him and he silently vowed to get Kelly back safely. “Good. That’s what we’ll do. Andrew, how much money have you liquidated so far?”

“Two million but I can have another eight million ready by tomorrow morning at seven o’clock,” Andrew answered somberly.

“Okay,” Jack said as he turned back to Chad. “What’s our next move?”

“I’ve got Sam, one of my best hackers here already, Jack. She’s ready to trace any calls that come in. In the meantime, she’s watching chat rooms and cyber boards for any info on the sale angle. As soon as we get any information, I have a team ready to move on it. We’re also going to monitor incoming 911 calls to see if anything leads us to the location of the women. It’s a long shot, but someone might call in something suspicious and we’ll just check out any leads.”

Jack nodded, accepting Chad’s plan. Even with all the financial resources and experts at his disposal, he felt helpless. And he didn’t like that one bit.

* * *

Kelly watched the window as night fell. She had gone to check over and over, hoping to catch someone’s eye. She couldn’t call out for fear it would cause the men to come in to stop her. If they came in and saw the water flowing in the bathroom, they would know what she was up to and then she would have nothing. The window was nailed shut, so no one would hear her screaming at the window anyway. She lay back down and tried to rest, to wait for whatever opportunity came next. She pictured Jack and tried to run through every memory of every moment she could remember with him in an effort to still the fear that ran like ice through her veins.