Stolen: A Novel of Romantic Suspense (12 page)

“You were there,” Shay said quietly.

“Yep. The entire time.”

Lorna had been there. Elliot had a witness. He had proof he hadn’t done anything.

Shay’s mind ran wild at the thought that Lorna had also seen this woman. Lorna had information, too. Should she ask? It wasn’t as if Elliot was talking to her. Would Lorna? Moving to the window, she stared out at the watery, wintry sunlight streaming through the clouds. Resting her head on the pane of glass, she closed her eyes.

No. First, she needed to talk this over with Elliot. Elliot was now personally invested in this … and she was still personally invested in him, whether he wanted to be with her or not. She had to fix things, because this crazy woman, whoever she was, was fucking things up for Elliot in the worst way.

Swallowing the knot in her throat, she asked quietly, “Is Elliot with you? I kind of need to talk to him.”

“He’s around. But he’s got his hands full right now. He’s …” Lorna’s voice trailed off. Over the line, Shay heard the gurgle of conversation ebbing and flowing. Once it quieted, Lorna spoke again. “He’s talking to our lawyer, Shay. Now, he’s just our family lawyer and he can’t do much to help with this other than advise us which way to go next, but what that woman is doing is slander. I mean, she could fucking
ruin
us.”

“Libel,” Shay said faintly, horror blooming inside her
as she realized what Lorna was getting at. She hadn’t understood just how bad this could get for Elliot.
Oh, hell
.

She had to fix this.

“It’s libel,” she said again. “She’s not speaking it—she’s putting it down in print, and it’s on the fucking Internet, so it’s
forever
unless it gets retracted.”

Or proven wrong … Shit, why didn’t I think of that?

Turning back to stare at her computer, she said quietly, “I have to go, Lorna. Tell Elliot I need to speak with him as soon as he has time. It’s important, but I know he has a mess going on, so when he’s got a few minutes.”

Without waiting another second, Shay disconnected and moved back to the computer.

Once more, she pulled up the complaint page for Facebook. She had to shut this bitch down.

She started another complaint about the fake page, and she also included the fact that the impersonator was now making false allegations against an innocent man and provided links to the statements.

Of course, they were very likely to claim it was just her word against the impersonator’s. As a cynical smirk curled her lips, she muttered, “I ought to just put a fucking statement on my website …”

Then, as that idea hit her full in the gut, she whispered, “My website.”

Shay swore. She was a fucking
idiot
.

Why hadn’t she thought of this before?

Her website had a
news
section. It was basically a blog.

Shay didn’t use it as one, but that’s what it was.

Her hands were sweating as she stared at the computer and told herself she needed to do this.

“Are you there?”

She nodded, forgetting that Angie couldn’t see her. Of
her three sisters, Angie was her favorite and the one closest to her in age. She was the only one who knew
who
Shay was now, where Shay was now, and what Shay did. She’d been close to all of her sisters before … well. Before. But now it was just Angie. Angie was also the only one who knew about Shane.

After the attack, Shay had been determined to cut all ties and while the others hadn’t completely understood, they’d respected her decision. Shay had been terrified Jethro would come after her again someday and she didn’t want to endanger any of her adopted siblings, even though they had all been out of the house by that time, and most of them were married.

While she’d been able to cut ties with most of them, though, she’d missed Angie too much. One year after she’d run away from Arizona, she’d hunted Angie down.

And they’d kept in touch, through phone calls and then through email; their contact was infrequent, but it was enough.

Angie lived in North Carolina, and she was the one person who knew all of Shay’s deepest, darkest secrets.

Angie handled everything that had to do with Shay’s website, including the graphics and updates. And she’d hold her hand through this. Nobody but Angie could possibly understand how hard this was.

“This bitch is fucking whacked,” Angie said, her voice flat and angry.

“You must be checking out my so-called Facebook page,” Shay muttered, still staring at the computer. She was kind of hoping it would just disappear. Or that she could will the website into doing what she wanted without actually having to
do
anything. It wasn’t working so far.

“Yep. I went and checked out the page of the bookstore guy, too. He’s hot.”

Yes. Hot … that described Elliot to a T. Shay took a
brief mental break to ponder that. Some of the tension tightening her shoulders faded and she was able to take a deep breath.
Hold it … relax. Again …
As some of the panic receded, she laid her hands on the keyboard and asked quietly, “This isn’t a totally stupid thing to do, right?”

“Right.” Angie’s voice was solid and steady, just like the woman herself. “Sweetie, it’s the only
smart
thing to do. That bitch is pretending to be you, and you have to stop it. But first you have to have proof she
isn’t
you. This is proof. So do it. And give that hottie up there in Earth’s End a break. Maybe he’ll decide to come cuddle with you in your igloo as a way of saying thank you.”

Shay snorted. “I’ve lived here for years and I’ve yet to see an igloo.”

“That’s a shame. I think an igloo would be really cool—literally and figuratively. Hey, I know … he could help you build one and then cuddle with you.”

“You’re rotten.” Shay suspected Angie was trying to distract her. Swallowing, she flexed her hands, then reached up and adjusted the headset she wore so she could talk to Angie and still type. She could do this—she
had
to do this.

The looming, bright white of the screen seemed to glare at her, mocking her.

“Oh, shit. Angie, I don’t know if I can do this.” Shay closed her eyes, blocking out the image of that terrifying white screen. A few years ago, she’d written a short story about an agoraphobic who’d had to leave her house to escape a killer. This was kind of like that for her. She wasn’t terrified of the outside world, but she was terrified of exposing herself. And even this little bit was too much.

But what else could she do?
Nothing?
She’d done that, and look what had happened.

“Are you there, kid?”

Kid
. It made her smile, despite the fear fluttering inside her. Angie was seven years older than she. In some ways, Shay felt years older … and at the same time decades younger than her big sister.

“Yeah.” She made herself open her eyes and face that white screen.

“You have to do this. You know what she’s doing is wrong—it’s so fucked up, it’s not even funny, and you can start to set things to right. If you don’t do it …” Angie didn’t finish the sentence, but she didn’t have to.

Virna had drilled a certain set of values into her kids, including the one she’d adopted … Shay.

If you allowed an evil to continue and you did nothing to stop it, and there was something you
could
have done, you were just as bad as the evil-doers. How many children could have been saved from abusers if the people who knew about the abuse spoke up? How many victims of assault?

Ignoring evil perpetuated it.

And what this woman was trying to do to Elliot was evil … it could destroy him. Then there was the matter of the wrongful rape accusation—shit like that made it so much harder for real rape victims.

Shay had the power to step in and make things right.

She might be a terrified coward, but she couldn’t let that fear stop her. Elliot had talked about how she always had to be tough, yet she
wasn’t
. She was a damn wreck—she just knew how to fake it. So she’d fake it now. Fake it until she made it and she’d get through this.

Clearing her throat, she squared her shoulders. “Okay, Angie. I’m doing it.”

“Good girl.”

Silence hummed between them, but it wasn’t a heavy, awkward silence, wasn’t flooded with that awful need
to fill it. Shay wrote. On the other end of the line, Angie waited.

Moments later, Shay said, “Okay, so I want to read this through before I post it. How do I do that?” The setup was different from her online diary and the words had to be just right.

“You can save a draft.”

Shay fiddled around until she saw the option.
Okay—

A
preview post
link came up.

Her hands were sweating as she clicked on it.

“Shay?”

She whispered, “Yeah?”

“Are you okay? You’re starting to breathe kind of funny again.”

“I’m fine.” Damn it, this shouldn’t be so hard. It wasn’t as if she were taking out a public notice:
I’m in hiding in Alaska—come find me
.

“Yes, you’re fine,” Angie said, her voice soothing. “Nobody knows
who
you are. Remember that. Also, keep in mind, this is the best way to spread the word. Anybody can set up a Facebook page, after all. Not everybody can access your website and make these changes. Do it.” Angie’s voice was firm but gentle.

“I know, I know …”

She saved it. Chewing on her lip, she asked Angie, “Can you go in and read it?”

“Yeah, sweetie, I can.”

A few seconds of silence stretched out between them, and then finally Angie came back and said, “Sounds good to me. You did just fine. Now … 
publish the damn thing
.”

A smile cracked her lips. “Okay.”

She hit
publish
, and that’s when the shaking
really
started. “Oh, shit. I … um, I think I need a drink.”

“So get one.”

Her knees shook as she stood up to do just that. It didn’t matter that it wasn’t even noon yet. What did the song say again … 
it’s five o’clock somewhere …
that meant it was okay for the rum and Coke, right?

Over the line, she heard a few taps and clicks. “What are you doing?”

“A few widgets and things I need to update on the site. I’m also going to make sure I’ve got things as secure as I can get them. No site is one hundred percent hacker-proof, but we’ll do what we can.”

Shoving a hand through her hair, Shay said, “Hell, you think a hacker is doing this?”

“I don’t know. But we’re going to do every damn thing we can to make it secure. Have you changed your email passwords and everything?”

“No. Hell.” Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to think past the headache that was threatening to eat her alive. “I guess I need to get that done, huh?”

There was a pause, and then Angie muttered, “Help me. Please. Just give me patience.” Then she sighed. “Yes, sweetie, you need to get that done. Immediately. Look … somebody is pretending to be
you
. She had one of your books. She had your fucking bookmarks. What else does she have access to? Maybe nothing … but just in case …”

Something uneasy settled in Shay’s gut. “Yeah. Damn it. You’re right. I’m a moron.”

“No. No,” Angie snapped, her voice hard. “You’re not a moron. You were in the hospital less than a week ago. Then you come home to this mess and you’re doing the best you can to deal with it. Just start changing the passwords and shit, okay?”

After Angie hung up, Shay fixed her drink and then returned to her office, settling behind her desk. She stared at her website. The front page had an area that highlighted any updates to the
News
page and now there was a notice about the shit happening in her little place in the world, how somebody was trying to steal it from her.

For a long, quiet moment she stared at it, even though she knew she needed to change her passwords.

First, she finished up that complaint to Facebook, including a link to the updated news on her website. “There. That ought to be proof enough for them,” she muttered.

She sent another complaint to Twitter—that was another experiment in fun. But this time she had proof, hard proof, right there on her website, and nobody could change it.

Now … about those damn passwords …

Her phone started ringing. Sighing, she reached for it.