KIDNAPPED, A Romantic Suspense Novel (24 page)

Jake scooped a drop of mustard off the corner of her lip with his finger. “Yeah, but it will be a great story for him to tell his kids and grandkids.”

“What is this called?” Nicky asked, eyeing the cold drink in his hand with doubt.

“It’s a chocolate milkshake,” Jake explained. “Try it. I bet you’ll like it.”

He took a tentative sip, then grinned at both Samantha and Jake. “Da. I like.”

The pleasure on his face and the enthusiasm with which he tackled the all-American meal touched a spot deep inside Jake. The kid had lived such a hard life in the few years he’d been on the planet. Yet, he still had an innocence about him Jake wanted to protect.

Once this case had ended, where would Nicky go? To some foster home, probably. Would they treat him well? Take him fishing and camping like he so badly wanted? Would they teach him about his country, how to hit a curve ball? Would they love him? Or would it be another nightmare he’d have to learn to survive?

Samantha brushed Nicky’s hair out of his eyes as he took another long sip of the shake. “Don’t drink it too fast or you’ll get brain-freeze.”

“Brain-freeze?” Nicky stopped slurping, his eyebrows pulled down in a deep V.

“It’s something my brothers used to get all the time. If you eat or drink ice cream too fast, you get a headache right here.” She laughed and pointed to Nicky’s forehead.

They belong together—Nicky and Samantha
.

Jake watched the two of them. He couldn’t remember a time when he enjoyed being with anyone as much as he had Samantha and Nicky. He ought to just keep driving—take them as far away from this mess as he could. In another century he would have. But as an FBI agent, he knew there really wasn’t any place left for them to hide.

They had to face the people hunting them. The sooner, the better.

They finished their meal in companionable silence, watching the trucker return and pay for his dinner. As the trucker passed where they were parked on his way to his rig, Jake stretched his arm over the back of the seat, toying with a strand of Samantha’s hair. He rubbed the silky strands between his fingers.

“Do you have any idea where we’re going once we get back in the city?” She wrapped her lips around the straw and sipped on her drink. Jake tamped the urge to taste her again.

“Your brothers and I decided to contact my old partner.”

“Doyle?”

Jake nodded. “We planned to contact him in the morning. But now, it looks like you, Nicky and I are going to drop in on him for the night.”

“What’s Doyle like?”

“You know Joe Friday on the TV show Dragnet?”

She laughed. “Don’t tell me he’s that much of a straight arrow?”

“Worse. Doyle makes Friday look like Barney Fife.”

“Oh no.” She laughed harder.

Nicky looked from one adult to another. “This is good guys, Jake? This Barney Fife and Friday?”

Jake rumpled his hair, winking at Sami. “Sure are Nicky. And so is Doyle. He’s going to help us catch the Kreshnins.”

“Good. Boss
Kreshnin vnyabrachneye ribynoek
.”

Jake laughed and put the truck in reverse. “That he is, little partner. That he is.”

Samantha drew her eyebrows together in question. “What did he call Kreshnin?”

“The Russian equivalent for bastard.”

She nodded her agreement with Nicky’s assessment.

They headed back North to the city.

* * *

Jake drove through the dark residential section of Clintonville in which Doyle resided. When Doyle’s wife of twenty years had decided to get in touch with her feminine side, divorcing him to live with her lesbian lover, Jake had helped his old partner move into this house.

All the homes sat back from the curbs of the quiet, tree-lined streets. Many of them were built in the 1920's and 1930's at a time when the area boasted to be a very upscale part of the city. Due to the trend of home remodeling that gripped the north-side community in the seventies and eighties, many professionals invested in and still lived in the homes.

Several years ago, after joining the Bureau, Jake contemplated looking for a home here, too. Even though he’d decided not to have a family, the investment potential seemed like a sound choice at the time. Then the undercover assignment fell onto his desk and he put all his plans on hold.

Scanning the street for unmarked police cars or utility vans out of place this late at night, Jake passed Doyle’s house three times. Finally, reassured by the lack of obvious surveillance around Doyle, Jake turned into the alley behind the house.

He drove past the back of Doyle’s place, parking the truck between two giant fir trees.

“Everything looks quiet,” he said to Samantha as he turned off the engine. “You and Nicky stay here, while I go check it out up close.”

“No, Big Partner. We go with you.” Nicky’s eyes widened and filled with tears.

“Hey, little partner, you’ll be fine here with Samantha.” He patted Nicky on the shoulder. “I’m just gonna go make sure the coast is clear.”

“You come back
skora
?”

Jake nodded with great solemnity. “I’ll be
skora
, quick. But you have to promise to do something for me while I’m gone. Okay?”

Nicky leaned closer. “What something I do for you?”

Jake caught Samantha’s eye as he whispered to Nicky. “I need you to guard Sami while I’m gone. Don’t let anything happen to her. Do you think you can do that for me?”

“Da. I do, Jake.” Nicky nodded very solemnly. The fear in his deep blue eyes lessened.

With a squeeze to Samantha’s hand Jake eased the door of the truck shut. The soft crunch of gravel beneath his feet broke the stillness of the night. Jake prayed no dogs would announce his presence in the alley before he got a chance to reconnoiter the situation at Doyle’s.

Nothing stirred in the alley or the bushes lining the back of Doyle’s yard. Jack eased the gate open, cursing the almost imperceptible creak from the slightly rusted hinges. He left it propped open with a brick he found lying next to the drive. If everything checked out ok, he didn’t want to have the gate creaking back and forth when he brought Samantha and Nicky from the truck.

He hurried to the side of the house. Standing on the balls of his feet, he peered inside the kitchen window. True to form, neat as a pin, but no movement. The clock on the wall showed eleven-ten. Doyle was such a creature of habit. From eleven until eleven-thirty each night he sat in front of the news.

Jake worked his way to the front of the house, glancing into one of the living room windows. Yep, there he sat, drinking his nightly glass of milk. Jake bit down on the smile that played along his lips. Three things you could count on in life, the sun rising in the east and setting in the west, the moon going through its cycles, and Bill Doyle drinking warm milk in front of the channel ten news each night.

With quiet speed, Jake returned to Nicky and Samantha. She thrust one of the two backpacks at him when he opened the passenger door. God love the woman. She hadn’t waited for his return, but used the time to pack everything they needed to take with them. Jake locked the truck, then taking Nicky’s hand and signaling them to be as quiet as possible, he led them to Doyle’s rear door. He tried the doorknob.

Locked.

Samantha motioned for him to move out of the way. With a brow raised in question he inched back just enough to allow her to squeeze between him and the door. The warm scent of her vanilla shampoo wafted up to him. Her shoulder brushed his chest. Distracted by her nearness, he almost missed her actions.

She’d slipped the edge of a credit card into the door-jamb equal to the height of the door knob. With a wiggle or two, the door quietly popped open.

“I learned that from Matt, too” she whispered.

Reaching around her, Jake pulled her behind him. He motioned for them to follow him in the house. He closed the door with a soft click.

Another click sounded from the corner of the room. A gun being cocked.

The trio froze.

“Adding breaking and entering to your offenses, Rookie?” a gravel edged voice asked.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“Hello, Doyle.” Jake edged Nicky and Sami behind him, then with both hands up where Doyle could see them he turned to face his old partner. “How did you hear me outside?”

Sami peeked around Jake into the dark room. A lean figured man with a military haircut stood in the far corner of the room. The light from the hallway cast him in dark planes and angles, and the glint of light shone on wire rimmed glasses.

“You still crash through a surveillance like a bull in a china shop.” Easing the hammer on the gun back into place, Doyle slowly lowered his weapon. “Who’s that hiding behind you? Your accomplice and kidnap victim?”

Jake lowered his hands. He stepped aside to pull Sami forward. “This is Samantha Edgars. She’s an innocent person I kidnapped out of a parking lot. Now she’s mixed up in this mess and it’s my fault.”

Sami wanted to pinch him. He might have kidnapped her, but she’d chosen to help him. The fault for
their
dilemma didn’t lie at his feet. It belonged completely to the people who shot him and tortured Nicky.

Doyle didn’t say anything in response to Jake’s confession. He stood with his arms crossed, waiting like a schoolmaster for his pupil to finish presenting him with the facts.

“And this,” Jake put his hand on Nicky’s neck, urging him forward, “is Nicholas. He’s the reason we’re here.”

Doyle studied Sami and Nicky for a long moment, then nodded as if they’d passed some silent test. “Let’s go into the den and get comfortable. Then you can fill me in on how you got yourselves into this pile of manure.” With an odd rotating of his left leg and hip he limped past them, leading the way down the dark hall to his den.

Sami hesitated with her mouth open to ask the thousand questions flashing through her mind at warp speed. As if reading her thoughts, Jake silenced her with a finger to her lips and a shake of his head.

“Later,” was all he said. And with a not-so-gentle nudge, he pushed her down the hall behind Nicky and Doyle.

This tendency of his to force her to do things without question, like patch up knife and gun wounds, jump out of windows and follow strangers, irritated her to her toes. One of these days she’d get even with him for it. Just before she stepped into the den, she paused and stuck her tongue out at him.

“Is that an offer, Samantha?” He lifted an eyebrow in that cocky arrogant fashion of his.

She really, really wanted to slug him. And if he pushed her one more time, she might just do it. Narrowing her eyes in warning, she gritted her teeth and marched into the den.

Not really sure what she expected out of detective Doyle’s den, the high-tech room that greeted her didn’t quite fit what she’d imagined. Two computers, a fax, and copiers lined one wall and corner. Dark plantation shutters covered the single window, preventing anyone from observing the room’s contents from outside. Two phones, an answering machine and a police scanner sat on a corner desk. And against the last wall stood a large screen TV with two overstuffed wingback chairs and an ottoman arranged in front of it.

“How is the private security business going these days, Doyle?” Jake asked, leaning against the doorjamb.

“Not the same as putting the perps behind bars, but I have enough work to keep me busy.” Doyle punched a button on the remote and a video game popped onto the big screen. He handed Nicky a small hand-held controller. “Why don’t you sit here and play, while I talk to Jake and his lady friend.”

“Her name is, Sami,” announced Nicky as he scrambled onto the ottoman, his attention completely focused on the video game. For the first time since Sami met him, Nicky finally looked like any other nine-year old.

“Sit here, young lady.” The older man turned around one of the wingback chairs for her, and then one for himself. “Rookie, you can sit in one of the computer chairs if you want.”

“Thanks, Doyle.” Jake pulled out a chair, turned it backward so he could straddle it, lean forward and rest his injured arm across the seatback in front of him.

As Jake explained their dilemma to his old partner, Sami’s trained nurse’s mind noted how exhausted Jake’s face appeared with its drawn features and dark smudges beneath his eyes. A bruise had formed on his forehead where he’d been hit with the window debris the day before. The white butterfly strips she’d used to close it looked ghoulish against the purple and green skin.

His slumped body posture spoke volumes. He needed rest and wanted this to end. For a brief moment his eyes shifted to Nicky. In that unguarded instant she read both a longing and deep worry.

Funny, in less than a week she could read this intense man’s thoughts so easily at times. In all the years she’d lived with her ex-husband, she doubted she ever had such insight into his mind or feelings.

“And now you need my help.” Doyle’s gravely voice penetrated Sami’s reverie, bringing her back to the conversation.

“I hate to ask it, old man, but I have nowhere else to turn. The most important thing is to keep Nicky safe.” Jake ran his hand through his hair. The muscle in his jaw flexed repeatedly.

He hated asking for help. She wondered if he hated asking Doyle in particular or just anyone in general. If she hadn’t phoned her brothers on the sly, she knew he never would’ve agreed to their help.

“What do you need from me, Rookie?” Doyle propped his left leg carefully on the ottoman.

Jake hesitated a moment as if gathering his thoughts. “I need a conduit to both the feds and the Kreshnins. You have a pretty extensive snitch network. Any chance one of them could get to someone in the Kreshnin organization for us?”

“They’re a pretty closed group, those Russians, Rookie.”

“Believe me, I know that. It took me nearly three years to infiltrate even their outer edges. I met Petrov Kreshinin the month before this whole mess blew up in my face.” Absently Jake rubbed his shoulder.