Utopian Day (30 page)

His greed to get that money back from J.T. had
ultimately paved the way for Sasha’s abduction. Silas wouldn’t have
even known she existed if Nick hadn’t hired him to track down the
money in the first place. Now, Sasha of all people was beckoning
him to come over from the dark side, to turn over a new leaf, to
rectify some of the past wrongs. It was as if some cosmic force in
the universe, call it God if you like, was luring him to change his
ways and become a force for good.

He stared at the picture for a good few minutes.
Sasha could tell he was deep in thought, so she didn’t interrupt
him or demand an answer. That’s one thing she had learned from Mia.
When dealing with Nick, it was best to wait it out and not push
him. He would answer when he was ready.

Ever since he’d had that bout with cancer, Nick had
been pondering what his legacy would be after he was gone. He knew
that Mia loved him. Since Sasha had entered his life, he had come
to know that Sasha loved him. But beyond those two relationships,
what would there be in the world when he was gone that was a result
of his having lived his life? Money? Many people had money. In and
of itself, it meant little. A business? His businesses consisted
largely of gambling, both legal and illegal, as well as a healthy
real-estate portfolio – hardly what he considered a worthy
legacy.

He supposed that Sasha’s challenge was fortuitous.
He realized in that moment that she had just helped provide the
answer he had been looking for. He decided it was time to take the
plunge and take action instead of simply pondering the
possibilities. He looked back at Sasha.

“
What, exactly, did you have in
mind?”

“
Well, I have a few ideas. One was
a scholarship fund for medical students, a possible grant program
for research on renal disease and cancer treatments. There are a
lot of things we could do. Are you interested?”

“
Yes. As a matter of fact, I am,”
Nick replied, almost as astonished as Sasha to hear the words
coming out of his own mouth. “But we should discuss it with Mia
first. If we are going to do this, we need to make the decision as
a team.”

Sasha was beaming. She ran around behind the desk
and gave Nick a big hug.

“
Thanks, Nick, you’ve just made my
day!”

“
And you’ve just made mine,” he
said as he returned the hug.

Nick and Sasha talked it over with Mia when she
returned to the house for the day. She liked the idea of doing
something to help eradicate the diseases that had taken Sasha’s
mother and almost taken the love of her life away from her. It was
a way to fight back, and Mia had always been a fighter. She had
never been one to just sit around and do nothing when faced with a
challenge.

She and Nick had a private and more serious
discussion later that day. They decided to begin phasing out their
illegal enterprises in favor of legitimate businesses in gambling
and real-estate. Nick came up with a plan that would accomplish the
task in a little over a year. They decided that there was no reason
to continue to run the risk of getting sent to jail for mere
money’s sake. They would remain millionaires by virtue of the
income from their legitimate businesses alone.

They established the Katrina Beyer’s Foundation for
Public Good with an initial endowment of seventy-five million
dollars. The money was invested, and the grants and scholarships
would come out of the earnings, not the principle, so that the
foundation could continue to operate indefinitely. Sasha decided
that she was going to major in business with an emphasis on
non-profit management when she went to college in the fall, so that
she could take an active role in managing the foundation.

On spring break, as promised, Sasha traveled to the
Grand Cayman Islands to spend the week with J.T. Nick insisted that
her bodyguard accompany her. J.T. and Sasha had a great time and
Sasha discovered that she shared a passion for sailing with her
dad. They worked out a plan where Sasha would come and visit a few
times a year. J.T. hated to see her leave at the end of the week,
but he was pleased to know that she would be pursuing her plans for
the foundation. He was as proud as a father could be.

Chapter Forty-Seven

Silas McGruder, alias Bob Conner, came in the door
of his Nassau, Bahamas home whistling one of his favorite songs. He
was riding high after a good night at the blackjack tables at the
Crystal Palace Casino. He’d gone in with ten thousand dollars and
was coming home with fifty thousand. It didn’t matter right now
that, over the last few months, he had racked up a net loss of one
hundred thousand dollars. Right now, he was on top of the
world.

He went into his office and opened up the closet
door, revealing a large safe. He placed the briefcase containing
his winnings on the ground and kept whistling while he worked the
dial of the combination lock. He turned the handle and opened the
safe to reveal stacks of one hundred dollar bills. He smiled even
more as he removed the money from his briefcase and began putting
it in the safe.

Suddenly, he heard a door creak somewhere in the
house. He quickly reached into the safe and grabbed a .45 caliber
revolver before spinning around and bringing the gun up to firing
position. He slowly got up and began working his way over to the
office door. Besides the light in the office, there was a single
lamp on in the living room, as well as the light in the kitchen
range hood. It was too dark for comfort, but he couldn’t exactly
run around flipping light switches now.

He cleared the doorway as quietly as he could,
looking first one way, then the other. The back part of the house
was completely dark. He was taking a chance either way, but he
guessed whoever or whatever had made the sound was probably in the
front part of the house. He went left out of the office, moving as
quietly as he could, his gun at the ready.

He heard a sound in the kitchen, just ahead and to
his right. He quickly stepped forward and brought the revolver
around, using the door frame for cover. When he did, he saw the
neighbor’s cat jump down from the counter. He let out a sigh of
relief and lowered the gun.

“
You almost scared the crap out of
me, Melvin,” he said as he tucked the gun behind his back and into
his waistband.

He picked up the cat and walked over to the door,
opening it and tossing the cat outside. He locked the door and
began walking back towards the office to finish what he had begun a
few minutes before. He had taken one step into the office when
something hit him hard in the side of the thigh, causing his knee
to buckle. He cried out in pain as he dropped to one knee.

He reached behind him to grab the gun in his
waistband, only to have someone grab his wrist and twist it behind
his back. He felt the gun being removed as he was shoved forward
onto the floor.

“
The money is in the safe; you can
take it all, just let me live,” he said to his yet unseen
attacker.

“
Turn around,” a voice behind him
said.

He pushed himself up into a sitting position and
turned around slowly. As he saw Mia Bartonovich standing before him
with his own revolver trained on him, his eyes widened in fear.

“
How did you find me?” he said,
shocked that he had been tracked down. He had been so
careful.

“
It’s very hard to completely
disappear. First, I found out the name of your alias, and then I
waited for you to contact your ex-wife. I traced one of the calls
you made to her and found it came from Nassau; then, all I had to
do was show your picture around the casinos to find out where you
were. You should have stopped gambling.”

“
Son of a gun,” Silas said in
disbelief.

“
You should not have kidnapped my
daughter! You should not have hit her!” Mia said, her voice growing
louder with increasing emotion.

“
I…I’m sorry about that, o.k., I
wasn’t planning to hit her. I’m very sorry about that. Please, just
take the money and go.”

Silas began bringing his knee up slowly as he
talked, trying to get the backup pistol he had strapped to his
ankle within reach without being noticed.

“
You are just like my father. He
used to hit me when I did not do what he wanted.”

“
Look, I regret what I did,
really. I lost my head and I’m very sorry. Will you please forgive
me?”

He was close now, very close. If only he could get
her distracted for a moment. Then, as if on cue, Mia tossed the gun
into the far corner of the room. As soon as she let go of the gun,
Silas went for his backup. He almost had it out of the holster when
the telescopic baton that Mia carried slammed into the back of his
hand, causing him to involuntarily release his grip on the handle
of the gun.

He brought his other hand around and attempted to
punch Mia in the stomach as she was standing in front of him. His
punch never found its mark. Mia stepped inside of his swing and
brought up her knee, catching him in his face and breaking his
nose. Silas’ head snapped back as blood spurted out of his
nose.

He quickly regained his balance and lunged forward
with everything he had. It was a last-ditch effort to grab Mia and
wrestle her to the ground, where he could use his size and physical
strength to his advantage, but he was too slow. Mia stepped to the
side and connected a side-kick to Silas’ head, sending him off of
his trajectory and causing his head to slam into the door jamb. He
crumpled to the floor and didn’t move.

Mia had already re-positioned herself for another
offensive, but Silas remained motionless.

A few days later, Sasha came running into the
kitchen, where Nick and Mia were just finishing up their morning
coffee. She was ecstatic.

“
You’ll never believe what just
happened!” she exclaimed.

“
Tell us, my dear,” Nick
replied.

“
An anonymous donor has just given
9.5 million dollars to our foundation!” she replied, barely able to
contain herself.

“
That’s wonderful, Sasha!” Mia
responded.

“
The weird thing is, we haven’t
even been running a donation drive. I can’t figure it out,” Sasha
continued.

“
Well, I’m sure the word has
gotten around the philanthropic community about the work we’ll be
doing. I’m just happy there is someone who believes in the mission
enough to write a check for the cause,” Nick said.

“
Yes, I’m sure that’s it,” Mia
agreed, taking a sip from her coffee.

Later that week, Nick Bartonovich was seated in his
office perusing his email. He noticed an email from Mr. Watanabe –
the man they frequently used to track down delinquent debtors.
Inside the email were two sentences, followed by a link. The
message read simply, “
This will interest you. Not our doing
though.”
Nick clicked on the link and it brought up a story
from the
New York Times
.

A man was found dead in his home in Nassau, Bahamas
yesterday, the apparent victim of a robbery gone wrong. An
undisclosed amount of money was missing from an open safe found
near the body. The man has been identified as Silas McGruder, a
former New York City policeman who was living in the Bahamas under
the alias of Bob Conner. Police have no leads on who may have
committed the crime at this time.

Nick raised an eyebrow in interest.
Well, that’s
one potential problem we don’t need to worry about any more,
he
thought to himself. He forwarded the article to Mia before moving
on to other emails.

******************** THE END
********************

The following is a preview of the new book
The
Seer: book 1 in the Supernatural Gift series,
by author C.L.
Wells. For information on how to obtain further FREE preview
chapters of this book, please visit
http://fictionwithamission.com/ebooks/

CHAPTER ONE

Waves crashed against the rocks in a deafening
chorus of nature’s fury as the sea lashed the Tillamook Lighthouse
mercilessly. The storm had been in full force for about an hour now
and Dan Moses was hoping the generator house wouldn’t get flooded
again. Occasionally, one of the really big waves would hit and he’d
feel the vibrations from the soles of his feet to the top of his
head.

He had retreated to the main keeper’s quarters where
he sat in his favorite chair, waiting out the tempest that raged
outside. He’d given up on reading, which was what he usually did to
wait out the lesser storms that frequented the area. As the next
big wave hit and he felt the ground beneath him shake, he
remembered one of the stories he had read about in the history of
the lighthouse, from the great storm of 1934. During that storm,
the lighthouse had been repeatedly submerged by the onslaught of
waves. Sixty-pound boulders had been spewed forth from the ocean
and crashed through the roof of the lighthouse. The watch room had
been repeatedly flooded, the water rising up to the necks of the
watchmen before finally draining out of the entrance door to the
tower below them. They had been unable to leave the tower for the
duration of the storm, which had lasted four days. Dan hoped this
storm wouldn’t escalate to that level. At almost sixty, he was
getting too old for this.

Suddenly the violent assault of the waves ceased.
The wind continued to howl as it forced its way around the
buildings and he could hear the rain falling, but not a single wave
could be heard hitting the shore or crashing into the lighthouse
tower. Dan opened his eyes and sat up straight. He sensed a
presence he hadn’t felt in decades and he was instantly afraid.
Seconds before he would have laughed at the idea that there was
another living soul on this island besides himself. Now he was just
as certain that he was no longer alone. He strained to hear
anything that might indicate where his visitor could be.