Love Inspired Suspense January 2014 (49 page)

“It makes you feel big, doesn't it?” she muttered. “Showing off.”

He was close behind her now; she smelled mint on his breath. “You're not so different. That's why you all work so hard for that piece of gold to hang around your neck, so you can show off something the rest of the world will never get a shot at.”

“That's not why we do it,” she whispered.

“No? And there isn't just the smallest bit of showing off in what you do? And some pride in your dad when he thinks about his baby being a champion? No vanity at all in that? Don't we all deserve a chance to see our kids do that?”

An electronic chirp indicated he had triggered the trunk release. “Take a look inside,” he breathed.

Terror surged through her now, in a raging tide. She wanted to kick out at him and run for the door. But her father... She had to know.

He put a hand on the small of her back. “Go on. Look.”

The small trunk was dark inside. He pushed her closer until her thighs pressed the back bumper.

Daddy. Daddy.

She prayed as she had never prayed before, entreating her Heavenly Father to not let it be what she imagined in that blackened trunk. Stiffening, she tried to resist moving closer, but now both Trevor's hands were on her back.

Her skin went ice cold. One of his hands let go for just a moment and then there was a crackling noise, a surge of fire through her limbs, which seized uncontrollably, and she could not stop herself from falling into the trunk, arms and legs twitching. Helplessly she watched as the lid slammed closed above her.

EIGHT

M
ax made it to the shop a few minutes after Dan, who stood with his hands on his hips in the kitchen.

“She's not here.” Dan frowned. “Someone opened the garage door. My cabbies know to keep it closed. She called my cell several times but didn't leave a message.”

Max wanted to ask why Dan hadn't answered his daughter's call, but instead he tried her phone again. No answer. “All right. Let's think it through. Where would she have gone on foot? The café? The smoothie place?” He didn't think so, but Dan jogged out the door to go check while Max paced the cement floor. His fears would be proved wrong in a moment when Laney returned, orange smoothie in hand and that big grin on her face.

The minutes ticked by. He wandered through the back office, the kitchen, thinking she might have left a note for her father. The garage offered no further clues except a discarded piece of gum and the faint smell of exhaust.

Dan returned with Officer Chen. “Hello, Mr. Blanco. Glad to see you again. I was finishing dinner at the coffee shop when Dan came in. I thought I'd see if you'd located Laney yet. Haven't come up with anything on that guy who pushed you into the pond.”

Max wasn't sure if he was relieved or more concerned to have the police involved again. He was about to answer when the officer's phone rang and he stepped away to take the call. Dan stared off into space and a helpless feeling descended on Max.
Only natural to feel that way when your star athlete is AWOL.

But he wasn't thinking about her racing skills at that moment, her potential athletic worth. He was considering, just then, her smile, her big belly laugh, the way she kept an enormous messy list on a piece of poster paper to track all the people she was praying for at any given time, the fact, he couldn't help but notice, that his name never disappeared from that list no matter how many insertions and deletions there had been.

A memory from their life before the accident surfaced: Laney, hair flying in all directions, trying to wrangle a dozen seven-and eight-year-olds on the ice, a project for foster kids she'd developed and implemented all by herself in spite of her coach's discouragement. At the time he'd agreed with them, thought it cost hours she should have been using to train, but she'd explained it to him in no uncertain terms. “Max,” she'd said, thrusting a squirming boy into his hands. “You've got the same minutes in the day that I do. Make them count for something bigger than skating.”

Bigger than skating? The bizarre thought had left him speechless, but after the shock wore off, he'd done his best and joined in the melee. At the end of an exhausting hour came boxes of juice and dozens of slices of pizza. The whole gaggle wound up with smiles on their faces, waving goodbye to two very exhausted elite skaters.

He'd pondered her odd pronouncement for a long while. Minutes? His life had been defined by minutes, seconds, milliseconds, but he'd only cherished those tiny increments of time when they brought him glory. It occurred to him that Laney saw the minutes of her life in an entirely different way. Skating was part of it, but not the whole. He'd never understood it, but he felt warmed nonetheless. “Is it possible she got a lift back to the dorm?” Dan mused.

“I already called Jackie. She's not there.”

They both turned as Chen disconnected. “Got a call from a concerned citizen. She said she saw Laney walking on the side of the road.” He paused, delicate eyebrows drawn together. “She's confused.”

“What?” Dan said, gripping his arm. “Is she okay?”

“She's...unharmed. Caller reports she's somewhat incoherent.”

Max's gut clenched. “Head injury? Did she fall? Where is she?”

Chen shook his head. “That's the odd thing. She's on Mountain Loop, just past the grove.”

It was as if Max's body iced over from the inside out.

“But that's...” Dan started.

“The place where we got hit four years ago,” Max finished.

“I'll take you,” Chen said, heading for the door.

They traveled in silence, the officer driving with caution since the snow had deposited a thin cotton layer on the roadway. Max kept pressing the imaginary gas pedal under his own foot.
Faster,
he wanted to yell or wrestle Chen out of the driver's seat and take the wheel himself.

Incoherent? Laney was at the location of the horrific accident that both of them had tried so hard to put behind them?

Her room keys.

I found them in the refrigerator.

Nightmares he didn't know about.

Training drills she lost track of.

Skates she did not tie properly.

Was Laney's mind suffering the strain of trying to reclaim what she'd lost?

Don't even think it,
he told himself, forcing his body into stillness as the miles passed.

Finally, they pulled onto Mountain Loop Road and the picturesque hollow of snow-mantled pines. Something in his lungs knew the place, because he found it suddenly an effort to suck in a full breath. The crunch of metal, the snapping of bones. Did Laney still hear those horrifying sounds as clearly as he did? He had eyes only for the parked pickup truck, engine running, and the woman who stood near the passenger window. She wore glasses and a knit cap that nearly covered her gray curls. She hustled up to the police car. Max and Chen got out first.

“I'm glad you're here. I was on my way to town when I saw her wandering on the side of the road, crying,” the lady said. “She's been rambling about...”

Laney slammed open the truck door and launched herself at Max, tears rolling down her face, her body heaving with shuddering sobs.

“Birdie,” he whispered, wrapping her tightly in his arms, willing himself to take on some of the fear he felt tingling through her limbs.
Thank God,
he heard his heart say, and for that minute it did not matter how she'd come to be on that road, or any of the circumstances that might have led her there. She was safe. It was enough.
Birdie. Birdie.

She pressed her face so tightly to his chest he could not hear what she was saying.

“It's okay,” he crooned. “Take a deep breath.”

Dan hovered nearby. “What happened? How did you get here? Why?”

Officer Chen was writing notes as the gray-haired lady recounted the details. “She said,” the woman offered, glancing at Laney, “she said she'd been in the trunk of a car and someone dumped her here.”

Laney's head jerked up and she went rigid in Max's arms. “Yes, that's what happened. I was at Daddy's shop and Trevor Ancho was there and his Aston Martin, and he used a stun gun on me and locked me in the trunk and...”

Max tried again to get her to breathe slowly, to control the wild rush of words that he must not be deciphering properly. “Slow, Laney. Say it slow.”

She breathed with him for a moment and then told them again about Trevor Ancho.

Max's mouth fell open as he listened. “Who...? Why would he do that?” he finally managed.

“He's the man who broke Dad's window. He wants me to quit racing,” she said. “I thought he'd hurt Daddy. I thought Daddy was in the trunk.” She began to cry again, and this time Chen guided her to the backseat of his car, insisting that she sit in the warmed interior.

Dan clutched her hand. “Laney, I'm so sorry.”

Max stepped back and tried to gather his wits. The guy who'd busted into Dan's car had now locked Laney in the trunk of an Aston Martin and abducted her with the intent of pressuring her to quit racing? And he'd added the touch of dumping her at the spot of their hit-and-run?

It was bizarre.

He looked at Laney, clutching her father's hand, as Chen gave up trying to persuade her to go to the emergency room.

“Who is Trevor Ancho?” Max found himself asking Chen.

“Local businessman. Owns a fairly successful construction company.”

Max caught Chen's expression and turned to Dan. “Can you think of any reason he'd do something like this?”

“No,” Dan said flatly. “Can't think of one.”

* * *

Laney tried to get the words to come out in a way that would make sense, but she could tell by the faces around her that her retelling was only adding confusion. When she refused again to go the hospital, Dan stepped away and let Max kneel next to her at the car door.

“Hey, Birdie,” he said, giving her a smile and reaching for her hands.

She took his fingers in hers, trying not to squeeze too tightly. “Max, I'm not making it up. It happened.”

He nodded, voice soothing. “We'll just get all the details ironed out, but I want you to go to the hospital, just for a check. Would you do that for me and your dad?”

A thought occurred to her, proof of her wild claim. “Look on my back,” she said, getting out of the car and pulling up her jacket.

“Laney,” Max started.

“He used a stun gun or something, just below my ribs. There will be a mark.”

He tried again to stop her but she yanked up the material, exposing her bare skin to the cold. “Look,” she all but shrieked. “Is there a mark there?”

Dan, Chen and Max all stared at her back, as well as the lady with the gray hair. Slowly their gazes shifted to her.

“Can't you see it?”

“There's no mark, Laney,” Max said quietly.

Frustration bit at her. “My jacket must have insulated my skin.” She let the jacket settle back down around her middle. “But it happened. There must be tracks from his car. On the snow.”

Chen shook his head. “No tracks—snow has been falling steadily for the past few hours.”

Laney tried to think of some other detail she'd forgotten. She'd been locked in a trunk and abducted. There had to be some small piece of evidence to prove it. “You believe me, don't you?”

“Yes,” Dan said immediately. “I do.”

“What about you?” Laney said, turning her gaze to Max.

“You've been through a shock,” he said.

She put her hands on his chest and made him look in her eyes. “Max, do you believe me?” She saw it there, the glimmer, the suspicion that the whole strange episode was the product of her damaged brain. The sliver of doubt lodged itself deep down inside her heart, cutting through something tender and leaving a trail of pain in its wake. Her hands fell away and she stepped back, seeing her own troubled face mirrored in his eyes.

Suddenly her limbs felt weak, every muscle and nerve; even her neck was not strong enough to hold up her chin and her head drooped. She studied the snow at her feet, the laces of her shoes, anything to avoid looking at the man who did not believe her, who thought her brain was so compromised she would create such a story.

“Laney,” Max said, reaching for her.

She pulled away. “I get it. You think I made it up.”

“No...” he started.

“Don't,” she said, hearing an unfamiliar hardness in her own voice. “Don't pity me. Isn't that what you asked of me before?”

“I don't pity you.”

“Oh, yes, Max,” she said, a pent-up storm of emotion inside her begging for release. “You feel sorry for brain-damaged Laney Thompson, so addled that she's gone around the bend. The girl who needs to put up notes to remember the hot and cold water taps and can't tie her own shoelaces anymore.”

“You're putting words in my mouth, Laney.”

She could not stop the tide of anger and hurt that now boiled out in a bitter rush. “But truly the worst part is, you're worrying about what this means for the trials, aren't you?”

He shook his head. “That's not it at all.”

“You lie,” she spat, a fresh trail of tears loosing themselves down her face. “You lie, Max. Because all I am to you is an athlete, a girl with a little talent and a lot of drive who might not be able to skate fast enough to win. I'm a commodity that you use to get close to the medal, aren't I? The means to an end.”

“Laney.” His voice was barely a whisper. “Please.”

“It's true, Max,” she said. “And why should that hurt me? You've said all along we're trainer and athlete, nothing more. Strictly professional, you and me.”

Her father put a hand on her shoulder. “You're upset, baby. This isn't the time. Let's get you to the hospital.”

She felt like laughing. “I think maybe it's the perfect time, Dad. Everything seems so clear right now.”

So clear she thought she could hear the sound of her own heart cracking in two.